PublishedNov 26, 2022 1:32 AM EST
We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs.
Sign Up for Domino’s Newsletter
By signing up, you confirm you are 16+, will receive newsletters and promotional content and agree to ourTerms of Useand acknowledge the data practices in ourPrivacy Policy. You may unsubscribe at any time.
In Marie Kondo’s new book, Kurashi at Home, the organizing queen invites us to picture our dream life—from the second we roll out of bed to the moment we collapse back into it. And according to her, the whole tidy-home fantasy hinges on one hilariously specific daily habit: befriending your shoe closet. In this excerpt, Kondo explains why giving your soles some love is the fastest way to stop schlepping mess through the rest of your house:
Shoes are weird little treasures. On one hand, they’re basically disposable tire treads for your feet; on the other, they’re sculptures you can wear. Some people collect them like museum pieces, even though they could never wear them all. Even shoe minimalists have had that heart-flutter moment in a store, buying a pair they absolutely did not need but desperately wanted to take home.
I adore shoes—so much that one day I pulled every pair out of the cabinet, lined them up in the entryway, knelt on the floor, and stared at them for roughly an hour. Don’t ask why. I simply needed to hear their life story. They had sparkled under boutique lights, but now, crammed in the cabinet, they looked like they had lost their will to be fabulous.
Then it hit me: these poor things needed a spa day.
I grabbed my shoeshine kit and polished each pair until they practically winked at me. When I finished and laid them out on newspaper, I swear I heard a tiny chorus: ‘Okay, but what about our bottoms?’
Go ahead, crack open your shoe closet. Do you recoil? Or do you gasp with delight? Spoiler: it has nothing to do with how much you spent.
During a lesson, I watched a client handle her shoes like they were radioactive takeout containers. She had laid them on wrinkled newspaper and was holding each one at arm’s length between two fingers—even the gorgeous ones. I remembered her face when I’d asked her to pull them out. She had winced. She was treating her shoes like villains, even though they had once been displayed like engagement rings in a jewelry case.
Nothing in our closet gets the Cinderella-to-Cinderella’s-stepsister treatment quite like shoes. The reason is obvious: once we wear them, they get filthy. But that’s only because they’re out there fighting the dirt war on our behalf. Let’s be honest—shoes have the worst job in the entire outfit.
Maybe your shoes chat with your socks while you’re out. ‘Is it just me, or is it sweltering today?’ your left sneaker complains.
‘Definitely steamy. Hang in there,’ your sock replies, sagging a little.
But secretly, your shoes are jealous. ‘Must be nice,’ they think, ‘getting tossed in the wash after every single wear.’
We polish the tops until they gleam and strangers stop us on the street, but the soles? The soles get no credit. Yet they’re the ones trudging through puddles, gum, and mysterious sidewalk gunk. It’s the soles doing the thankless grunt work. They deserve a standing ovation—or at least a decent wipe.
That’s why I started wiping my shoe soles before bed or first thing in the morning while tidying the entryway. As I do it, I thank my shoes for carrying me through the day without complaint.
Sure, some days I’m too busy pretending I have my life together, but when I stick to this routine, it clears my head more than any other chore. Clean soles make me feel like I can walk into cleaner places. They say good shoes take you good places, but really, it’s the soles that get you there. After all, they’re the only part of you still touching the ground.
Reprinted with permission fromMarie Kondo’s Kurashi at Home: How to Organize Your Space and Achieve Your Ideal Lifeby Marie Kondo. Published by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of Penguin Random House.
Copyright © 2022 by KonMari Media, Inc. English translation copyright © 2022 by Cathy Hirano.Author and lifestyle photographs copyright © 2022 by Nastassia Brückin.Still-life photographs copyright © 2022 by Tess Comrie.
Learn more about Domino.comEditorial Standards
