The surprisingly powerful ritual of changing to go nowhere.
I regularly change my clothes to go approximately twelve feet.
I'm not going out, nobody is coming over and I have no dinner reservation.
I'm going to my living room. And somehow, changing still matters.
There is a point in the day when I no longer want to be wearing whatever I was wearing for the day.
Sometimes it's immediately after work. Sometimes it's later. But eventually, the day clothes come off and something softer goes on.
Then, later, I might have a shower. The evening clothes come off. A robe or kimono goes on.
And eventually, when I'm actually ready for bed, that comes off too.
It's not one dramatic transformation.
It's a series of small ones.
And I've started wondering whether changing our clothes throughout the evening does something more interesting than simply make us comfortable.
We usually change because we're going somewhere
Think about how often clothing marks a transition.
You change for work.
You change for the gym.
You change before dinner.
You change before going out.
You change for a date.
The clothes tell you something is about to happen.
But changing in the evening is strange because sometimes absolutely nothing is about to happen.
You might be moving from the kitchen to the couch. That's it.
Nobody is going to see the outfit. There is nowhere to arrive.
And yet changing can still create the feeling that one part of the day has ended and another has begun.
I'm not going anywhere.
I'm just not doing daytime anymore.
We used to dress for different parts of the day
There was a time, particularly among wealthier classes, when changing clothes throughout the day was much more deliberate.
Morning dress. Afternoon dress. Dinner dress. Evening dress.
Dressing gowns. Robes. Nightclothes.
Clothing didn't only communicate where you were going or who might see you. It could communicate what part of the day you were in.
Our relationship with clothing has obviously become far less formal. And then COVID blurred the boundaries even further.
Suddenly, loungewear wasn't necessarily what you changed into after work. It might have been what you wore to work.
Comfort moved into the daytime. Luxury fashion followed it.
Cashmere sets, silk separates, beautiful robes, elevated pyjamas, loungewear became something worth designing rather than something we threw on when nobody was looking.
I love that.
But it creates an interesting question.
If we're comfortable all day, what tells us the day has changed?
For me, it's the robe
There's something about putting on a robe after a shower that feels different from putting on comfortable clothes after work.
I'm not just home anymore. I'm winding down. Maybe it's the shower, maybe it's the bare skin underneath or maybe it's the fact that robes belong almost entirely to private life.
I'm probably not answering emails in it; I'm definitely not going to the grocery store.
By the time the robe goes on, the radius of my evening has become very small.
Home.
Bathroom.
Bedroom.
Bed.
Nothing about the robe is forcing me to relax.
But I've repeated that sequence enough times that putting it on has started to mean something.
We're getting closer to sleep now.
The evening has stages
We tend to talk about the hours before bed as though they're one block of time.
Evening.
But they don't necessarily feel that way.
There is the part where you're still finishing things.
The part where you're home but still active.
The part where the house starts getting quieter.
The shower.
The skincare.
The robe.
The moment you realize you're not doing anything else tonight.
Then, eventually, bed.
Maybe clothing is simply one of the ways we move through those stages.
Not because there is a scientifically perfect outfit for winding down.
There isn't.
And not because everyone needs three costume changes before getting into bed.
But because changing something physical can help acknowledge that time itself has changed.
Getting dressed to go nowhere
There is something wonderfully indulgent about having clothes specifically for a part of your life almost nobody else experiences.
Because sometimes changing clothes isn't preparation for where you're going next.
It's a way of acknowledging where you've already arrived.
-Dawn Melody
Sleep Architect + Founder, Sleep State of Mind
LIMINAL
THE SPACE BETWEEN AWAKE AND ASLEEP
