Oti Mabuse is decluttering her new home – and some Strictly Come Dancing fans are likely to be very happy about it.
The former Strictly dancer intends to make space in her new wardrobes by getting rid of some of the gorgeous dresses she wore on the show. And dance fans will be able to get their hands on them, because she’s going to sell the glitzy dresses – and plenty of other ‘clutter’ too – on eBay.
But getting rid of the dresses isn’t proving quite as easy as she thought it would be.
“I’ve got some old Strictly dresses that I was going to put up for sale,” she says, “and then I put them on, and I was like ‘Oh my gosh, they fit!’
“But I don’t have a use for them any more, even though I’m going on tour – we’re going to get completely new outfits. It’s stuff like that, that I absolutely love and I have great, great memories of but I’m not going to be using anytime soon. And I think some Strictly fans would be more than happy to have some dresses that have a bit of memory, that maybe they can frame up or can use themselves. So I’m definitely decluttering that.”
And will she be getting rid of many dresses?
“I don’t know – I think it’s endless,” she says with a chuckle. “I’m still unpacking some of my clothes, and some of them – oh, my God, we all have that one dress where you’re like ‘one day I’m going to fit back into that’, and we keep it at the back of the closet. I have so many of those, so I’ll probably just be getting them out and getting rid of them.”
Mabuse, 34, had her first child, a daughter, 17 months ago – but she admits her maternity clothes will not be part of her decluttering mission.
“I really do want to grow my family, so that’s probably my ‘Oh, I’m going to put that at the back of the closet in case one day it fits’,” she admits. “So no, I’m not getting rid of my maternity stuff.”
But whether she uses her maternity gear in the future or not, the proud mum says pregnancy has “100%” changed her body. “And I’m embracing every little bit of it,” she insists. “Everything is just a completely different size or shape or movement. But I’m really loving my new body – it’s given me the most amazing human being in my life, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The South African dancer, her Romanian dancer husband, Marius Iepure, and their precious baby girl moved house “to the country” a few months ago, but didn’t get rid of much stuff before the move, so they’re determined to make space in their new home now.
“Before this, I hadn’t got rid of much, but now so much stuff is going up,” she declares. “I think old clothes sell really well, and stuff from the kitchen – appliances that I don’t use any more, or stuff I’ve bought that I haven’t used at all.
“We have stuff from where we used to live that just doesn’t fit or doesn’t match the personality of where we are now that we’re not going to use and probably just leave in the garage. So that’s stuff we’re definitely going to put up, as well as prams, baby car seats she’s outgrown, baby toys – all that is going.”
And she doesn’t believe people need to be tough to have a big clear-out – just honest.
“We get to a point where it’s not really about discipline, it’s just about how you feel in the moment. If you don’t use something any more, you don’t need it and somebody else can use it, that’s great. I don’t think you have to be disciplined and hard on yourself, you just have to be honest with yourself.”
The kitchen appliances she intends to sell include a slow cooker, a smoothie maker and a mini-fridge, and she explains: “We have a slow cooker that we genuinely don’t use now because we have an air fryer, and a smoothie machine that we haven’t used in a really long time, and it’s good-quality stuff.
“We have a mini-fridge from when I was breastfeeding, and we needed milk to be in the fridge while I was pumping in the night. I didn’t want to walk up and down stairs, so I bought this little mini-fridge, and I think another mum could probably use that now.”
Mabuse, who’s also been a judge on Dancing on Ice, and is about to go on tour with her new show Viva Carnival, has even got her little daughter into a tidying mindset.
“She’s a baby, but we’re really good when we play – she knows that once we’re done playing, we pack up and we put everything back in boxes, and we put them where they go, and then she goes to nursery. We want to instil that in her while she’s still young. She’s already on it – she likes packing up and putting things back in boxes.”
Mabuse, whose older sister is the dancer and Strictly judge Motsi Mabuse, is hoping her decluttering – and her daughter’s love of putting things away – will give her little family much more space, and she says: “Just space really, not even for anything – just to have space. I think it clears the mind for me, definitely, when coming back to a house that’s clean, where I feel like I can think. It’s really good for my mental health.”
Research by eBay for its new List to £1K challenge, which is stressing spring cleaning and decluttering can earn households up to £1K from selling unused or pre-loved items, has found three-quarters (75%) of people are planning a spring clean this year, mainly to create more space (43%), improve mental wellbeing (37%), and make extra money (21%). Yet despite good intentions, 80% of UK adults admit to having unused or unwanted items in their homes.
More than half (54%) confess to keeping items just in case they need them in the future, with a quarter feeling they lack the time for a spring clean (25%) or don’t know where to start (21%).
“With it being spring, everybody will want to do a little bit of cleaning in the house, and you can take some of the items you don’t use or need and make money on the side,” says Mabuse.
“The main reason people usually spring clean is to create more space and to improve their own mental health, and they can also make a little bit of extra money. Sometimes less is more – you can create a bigger space by having less things.”
Oti Mabuse is supporting the eBay List to £1K challenge to encourage Brits to turn their unwanted items into cash.
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