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Creative Clemmie
Clemmie is a creative person.
A successful actress, playright and vintage clothes shop owner she has a busy life and a home that has to serve many functions.
When she called us she was at a stage in her life where clearing the clutter and getting organised had reached the top of the to-do list – or rather she’d had enough of the way it was and had decided to make time to deal with it.
As with all clients, Clare spoke to Clemmie on the phone before arriving at her home on the day of the home visit. It was, as always, a fascinating exploration of the whys, wheres and hows of Clemmie and her clutter. What became clear to Clare was that Clemmie had never really felt settled in her London flat – as though she hadn’t taken true ownership of it or wanted to make it a home, but now Clemmie had reached a stage in her life that she wanted a home rather than 4 walls, to make it more than a resting and sleeping place, and to organise it in such a way that it was able to serve it’s many necessary functions. Most importantly it needed to be a restful, social and creative space for her.
When Clare arrived at Clemmie’s home she found that Clemmie had already started sorting through the clutter. Wanting to make the most of the day, Clemmie had made the common mistake of ‘getting straight in there’ with the doing, so Clare helped Clemmie take a step back and do some practical preparation first – defining the space, thinking about function and layout, thinking about the contents of her clutter with the Clutter Clearing Category Cards. Although Clemmie was unsure about this step back approach, she trusted Clare and later remarked that ‘if I’d been paying by the hour rather than a fixed fee I would have been much more resistant to going with your way of working because I would have been paying for something I didn’t understand the benefit of at the time – but I did see the benefit and importance of it later on. In fact, it was the thing I’d been doing wrong in the past when I’d tried to do it on my own, so it was crucial to my success this time’. Once Clare and Clemmie got down to the doing, Clemmie worked swiftly and easily through all her belongings thanks to the step back and preparation. She remarked many times that she couldn’t believe how much stuff she had, that she had overestimated how much would get done in just one day, and that she felt confident she could continue with this simple process on her own.
As with many creative people Clemmie isn’t one for paperwork, so she gave all her paperwork the category heading of ‘boring stuff’. As Clare worked on organising the clutter in her lounge and Clemmie focused on categorising it, all Clare could hear was ‘boring stuff’ being repeated time and again from the hall!
By the end of the day, with Clare’s help not only had Clemmie found a home for all her makeup and beauty treatments, but she’d also cleared the clutter in and redefined her lounge to accommodate a social area, entertainment area, work area, meditation area and exercise area – not bad going for a room approx 4m x 6m! There were smiles, laughter, memories shared, energy, light and an ability to see how fabulous Clemmies home would be.
As Clemmie writes:
‘I am still loving my flat, I’ve had my first dinner party in years and just love spending time in the sitting room in the evening. I also sat down to start my next play as the first has gone into production now and – you are not going to believe it – it took me 48 hours to write what took me 9 months on the first play! It is remarkable. Quite remarkable! Thank you so much again for keeping in touch’.
Result after one day of help in the home:
