How to Pack Clothes for a Move

All My Sons Moving & Storage provides professional packing services and has some special tips for packing your clothing for moving. 

From the cozy winter sweaters to the snazzy suits and the floor-length evening dresses, your wardrobe is a precious part of your daily self-expression. The t-shirts and jeans that make up your casual day wear and the flashy club dresses that you take out by night will all need to find a way on the truck come moving day. 

Follow these 5 steps to make sure your clothing makes it to your new home in great condition.

The first step in any move should be to determine what’s coming with you and what you should purge from your life. Your closet is a great place to start that process.

Take some time a few weeks before your move to sort through your closet and separate what needs to go. Try on items and inspect them for wear and tear. Keep items in good condition that you wear often, or items too sentimental to part with. Ill-fitting items in good condition and items in poor condition should be sorted into the following purge piles:

• Sell: If you’re needing some extra cash for your move and have clothing items in great condition that you’re ready to part with, you can try selling some items. Hold a garage or yard sale, list them on Facebook Marketplace, or try taking them to a local thrift or consignment store that offers cash or store credit for clothing items. Some online thrift stores that will take used clothes in good condition for cash or store credit are ThredUp, Mercari, and Poshmark.

• Donate: Clothing items in good condition that you do not desire to sell can be donated to your charity of choice. You can search for local charities that accept clothing donations or donate your clothing to a national charity like The Salvation Army or Goodwill.

• Discard: Items that are not in good condition and cannot be repaired should be discarded. You can research options for textile recycling in your city or use a service like Trashie or Retold Recycling to ship your unwanted clothes in for sorting, recycling, and responsible disposal.

Once you have off-loaded all the excess that no longer serves you, you can proceed to packing for your move. With less items to pack, you’ll feel lighter when you move into your new home.

Some of your clothing items you will want on hand during your move or available almost immediately upon your arrival at your new home. 

You should separate at least 2 to 3 days’ worth of weather-appropriate clothing to put with your bedroom essentials. These items you will pack last and unload at your new place first. With some essentials unpacked at your new place, you’ll have clothes until you’re able to unpack the rest of your clothing.

You may want to keep an extra outfit on hand in your essentials and emergencies bag during your move. Keeping an extra outfit allows you to change in case something spills or damages the clothing you are wearing on your move day.

The week before your move, do a few loads of laundry to get your clothes ready for moving. Make sure that your clothes are completely dry before you start packing them. If you have pieces that need to be dry-cleaned then it might be in your best interest to make a dry-clean run before the move as well.

This step is especially important if your clothes are going into storage for any length of time. To avoid mold, mildew, or a foul scent spreading through all your clothes, you should store them when they are clean and dry.

Now that you have purged the excess clothing from your wardrobe, determined which clothing pieces will be packed with essentials, and given all your clothing a good wash, it’s time to start packing for the move.

You have a variety of options for packing your clothing. You might choose to fold all your t-shirts into medium boxes but hang all your dresses in a wardrobe box. Take a look at the options below and decide what works best for your different clothing items and your move.

• Small to Medium Boxes: Fold or roll your clothes and pack them into small to medium boxes. Lighter items can safely go in larger boxes as long as you’re still able to lift the box when it’s fully packed.

• Wardrobe Boxes: Hanging clothes can be packed into these special boxes typically available wherever moving supplies are sold. Simply install the wardrobe box bar and hang your clothes on the bar until no more garments fit inside. Always keep the wardrobe box upright when you are moving it and you should be able to stash your closet items at your new home in record time.

• Plastic Bins: You can transport clothing in clear or opaque plastic bins. Bins work well for hardy shirts, jeans, jackets, or sweaters. Clear bins allow you to see what’s inside at a glance. Be sure to label any opaque bins so you don’t forget what’s inside.

• Garment Bags: Your highly sensitive formal wear items like tuxedos, prom dresses, evening dresses, wedding dresses, and suits should go in sturdy garment bags. You can hang these in a grand wardrobe box or transport them individually. You can also create a DIY garment bag with a trash bag and a hanger for those semi-formal items you want to keep a little safer, but taking the DIY route is not recommended for your highly sentimental formal wear items.

• Trash Bags: Running out of boxes? Your sturdy clothing items like jeans and t-shirts can be safely transported in plastic garbage bags. Keep in mind that items packed in trash bags might wrinkle, and bags could tear and spill their contents if you don’t watch out for puncture risks.

• Vacuum Bags: You can save significant space by packing your clothes into vacuum-seal bags. This option works best for your bulky winter clothes. Some more sensitive materials like silk, cashmere, and leather should not be stored in vacuum-sealed bags as they can permanently crease and wrinkle during the storage period.

• Keep Clothes in Dresser: Some moving companies will allow you to transport your dressers with clothes still inside the drawers. This could save you the time and hassle of packing, just ask your movers if it’s an option for you in advance.

Once all the clothing items are put away in their respective containers, seal up your bins, boxes, and bags.

Tape up boxes and bins. Use a dark marker to write the contents of your box on the top of your box.

If you are using trash bags to transport some clothing items, tie the bags closed. Be sure to  differentiate your moving trash bags from any trash bags you might be carrying out to the garbage. Label your bags. If you cannot write on the bag itself then stick some paper tape on the bag and write your label on paper tape.

If you have a clothing piece that you’re especially fond of or might need soon after your move, be sure to label which box, bin, or bag it went into. If you have extra time before your move, you might consider creating an inventory of your most important clothing pieces so you always know what you own. 

Huzzah, the clothing is packed! You’ll be able to enjoy social outings in your favorite band t-shirt and dancing in your breezy summer dresses for years to come in your new home.

Make your big move with help from the professionals when you ask All My Sons Moving & Storage to do all the loading and lifting. Call 1-866-726-1579 to reach one of our 90+ locations across the nation or use our online quote form to get started on your move.