Formats Unpacked: Sort Your Life Out by the BBC

Hey,

I’m a big fan of anything to do with interior decoration and decluttering, so I’m amazed I hadn’t heard of Sort Your Life Out before. There’s always a first, I suppose. Plus, this means I now have a whole new show to queue up to watch!

Today’s unpacker is our very own Christopher Mitchell, Executive Producer at Storythings. Chris is a true audio and creative talent, so much so that a narrative series he produced recently, Redemption Man, was just shortlisted for The Whickers Podcast Pitch Award, with a chance to go to Sheffield DocFest for the final pitch.

We’re all about amazing formats like this one, so if you’d like us to help think about one for you, get in touch - we’d love to help!

Over to Chris…

What's it called? 

Sort Your Life Out - where families recycle and upcycle their way to a new home.

What's the format?

Sort Your Life Out (SYLO) is a British reality television series created by Optomen Productions. The show is hosted by 2009 X-Factor finalist Stacey Solomon and focuses on helping families declutter and reorganise their homes. Solomon and a team of makeover experts assist participants in evaluating their possessions, encouraging them to let go of items they no longer need, and transform their living spaces into more functional and harmonious environments. The series combines elements of home makeover, organisation, humour and personal storytelling to highlight the emotional and practical aspects of decluttering.

Debuting on BBC One in 2021, SYLO sees Stacey Solomon, known and loved for her relatable personality and passion for homemaking and arts and crafts, joining a team of experts, including carpenter Robert Bent, organiser Dilly Carter, and cleaner Iwan Carrington. Together, this Fantastic Four of home makeovers guide families through the fun and sometimes arduous decluttering process. 

Described as a “truly perfect show” by The Guardian, SYLO goes beyond the usual home makeover format. Houses are emptied of all possessions and laid out in a massive warehouse. The main categories for sorting and decision-making include recycling, donating, and selling, with additional categories for specific items like kitchenware, clothing, and children's toys. 

After the shock of the sheer number of items taken from their homes wears off, the families then have to decide what can stay and what gets thrown away or recycled. Stacey proves to be a master of easy conversation, as she naturally provides space for the families to share backstories about their possessions and how much they mean in the lives of the families. 

Meanwhile, back at the family home, Stacey’s expert team, Robert, Dilly and Iwan make the impossible look easy and transform the living space in time for the kept possessions to be moved back in. The entire transformation occurs within a week, from initial decluttering to the final reveal. 

Click here to watch a cheeky clip of one home transformation featured in the show.

What’s the magic that makes it special?

An Empathetic Host: Stacey’s warm demeanour creates an open and relatable vibe.​

A Specialist Team: Collaborating with professionals ensures families receive the best home improvement advice.

Visual Impact: Laying out all possessions in a warehouse highlights the extent of the clutter. The striking image serves as motivation for families to make significant life changes.

Emotional Storytelling: The personal anecdotes offer further insight into the participants’ emotional attachments and everyday challenges.

Relationship Dynamics: This is a show about people and how their families relate to each other. The personality layers are peeled back slowly throughout each episode, and viewers can see glimpses of themselves.

Favourite episode

My all-time favourite episode of SYLO aired in March 2025 and hits close to home. Stacey and the team visited Dee and Aaron, who are close friends of my wife and me. Long story short, they saved up for years to buy their home, but the mix of working full time, health challenges and the everyday demands of parenting made it difficult to keep their home in check. Watching them, their two kids and Stacey wade through their belongings to confront the clutter, including 49 make-up brushes, 213 CD’s and 552 books - was incredible. Watching Aaron give up some of his legendary music collection was painful. I wanted to hug him, but I’m glad he decided to keep my 2016 album, Adventures In Technicolour, in his stash. Thanks Aaron!

Dee, Aaron, and their children, Zora and Elias, returned to their brand-new digs a week later, and their initial response filled me with so much joy. Their emotions were palpable through my plasma screen. The newly minted pad was a clever upgrade of new storage spaces, racks and rails and new rooms for the kids. The organisation levels were so high, I nearly shed a tear. The SYLO hit squad even converted an old shed into an outdoor office powered by a portable battery. I want one of those! My highlight from this episode is when Iwan managed to get a burn mark from an iron out of the carpet. That’s the kind of sorcery that makes paying the TV Licence worth it. Carpet burns aside, the home makeover forced Dee and Aaron to face the chaos in the clutter head-on and provided a fresh start for the couple to create and curate memories for themselves and their children. 

Other great episodes of SYLO that get a rewind from me include:

Sheeney's Story: Sheeney opened up about her emotional journey of being abandoned during pregnancy at 17, leading to her habit of hoarding.  

The Clarke Family Transformation: This episode showcased a dramatic home makeover and highlighted the positive impact and mental health benefits of decluttering on family life. 

Similar formats

Several television programmes share similarities with SYLO, focusing on decluttering, organisation, and home transformation:​

• Tidying Up with Marie Kondo: This Netflix series features Organisation OG, Marie Kondo. She helps clients declutter their homes using her KonMari method. 

• The Home Edit: Also on Netflix, this show follows serial organisers Joanna Teplin and Clea Shearer as they overhaul homes for clients, including celebrities.

• Hoarders: A&E's long-running series deep-dives into the lives of people struggling with compulsive hoarding disorder while providing psychological insights to explain the method in the madness.

These programmes, like SYLO, combine practical decluttering techniques with personal storytelling, aiming to inspire viewers to evaluate and improve their own living spaces.​

Thanks Chris!

Storythings would love to help you find a format that works uniquely for your organisation, by telling your story in a way that brings people back again and again. Just like the formats we feature in this newsletter!

We can start working very quickly and lightly, by running a workshop-version of this newsletter to identify formats that might work for you - it’s even called the Formats Unpacked workshop! Press the pink button above and let’s have a chat.

See you next time with another amazing format to unpack,

Anjali

If you need more creative or strategic inspiration, please sign up for our other newsletters Attention Matters and the Storythings Newsletter. Join our network of over 12,000 creative explorers!