Packing for a holiday or for a long trip is often a form of art. Especially if you don’t have much luggage space available or if you can only take cabin baggage. We’ve put together a few tricks to help you pack. You’ll be less likely to forget something, you’ll fit more into your bag, and you’ll be able to travel with smaller baggage.
Before You Open Your Bag
Make a list! Good old lists are always a great tool to help yourself remember what you wanted to pack. Write down the things you think you need, take some time to think about it, and then cross some of those things off. In reality, you’ll never even use many of the things you wrote down. Here are a few tips:
- Bring clothes from light and breathable materials. If you don’t have any, you can just visit your local sports shop. They usually offer activewear (sportswear) with UV protection. These kinds of clothes stay fresh for a long time and, when they do get dirty, you don’t have to wash them for a long time either.
- Combine what you have. If you have a skirt and three shirts, you actually have three different outfits. Pack a pair of shorts and you suddenly have 6 outfits! If you pack a black skirt of black shorts, you can combine them with pretty much anything.
- You should pack liquid makeup into small 100 ml bottles and seal them in a plastic bag. Before you close each bottle, it’s a good idea to wrap the top with some tinfoil in order to prevent the contents from spilling out. You should ideally use a transparent zip bag. On one hand, it’s a good way to protect your items and, on the other hand, it’s required of you anyway if you want to pack them in your cabin baggage.
- Multifunctional items are your friends. Instead of having a separate day and a night cream, you can just use one cream for both and also for your hands. You can wash your body with shampoo, too.
- With every item, ask yourself the following questions: “Will I need this every day? If not, can I buy it where I’m going? Would it be too expensive?”
- Take 2 – 3 pieces from every article of clothing, not more.
- Instead of bringing physical copies of books and magazines, you can upload them into a Book Reader or a tablet.
Saving Space in Your Bag
You’ve probably already figured out that folding and stacking shirts into your bag won’t really save you any space. Quite the opposite, actually. You’ll just end up with a lot of unused space in-between. A good way to avoid this problem is to roll up your shirts instead. You can also place small clothes, such as socks or underwear, into a bag and then into your shoes, While packing, keep in mind that larger and heavier things should go on the bottom of your bag while light and fragile items should be on top.
Going for a Business Trip?
If you’re only traveling short-distance and don’t want to risk damaging your clothes, have a look at the tips in this video.
Have any of your own packing tricks? Tell us in the comments below!
