Yesterday on Instagram, I talked about updating the functionality of my closet. For a very old house, BHH has substantial closet space in most of the rooms. Back in the olden days, people did not have as much stuff, and therefore, they did not need as much space to store it.They were minimalists before minimalism was cool.
We are particularly baffled by this boon since BHH was built to serve as a summer house. Summer houses had even less storage than a typical full-time residence. They often had very small shallow closets or no closets at all because summer people kept the wagon loads as light as possible. Since there are ample closets in this house, we can only draw one conclusion: The family that built BHH were hoarders.
Now is the perfect time to work on the closet because A) I’m stuck inside a lot, and B)It’s the new year, and that makes me want to organize of all. the. things.
The Closet Plan
Before I get started, it is worth noting that Andy and I do not share a closet. His is right outside the master bedroom door, and it is approximately the same size as mine.
The best part of my closet is the built-in dresser. The drawers are enormous (35″ X 16″ X10″). Aside from painting it, I do not plan to make any other alterations. Fun fact: The drawer pulls are original!
On the bottom drawer, I have noted that I will use it for bags and backpacks. I have several that I pack and unpack for different purposes. Currently, I dump them on the floor. The drawer is plenty large enough to hold them.
Above the dresser is a pile zone for me. That’s where I dump clothes I can wear again, the junk from my pockets, jewelry, running gear, etc. There is a ton of room here. I do not have an exact plan yet, but I will likely create some variation of cubby storage. While I am thinking, I will pop into my local thrift shops to see if I can find anything useful.
The heavy hitter of this project will be the back wall. There is plenty of room for my hanging clothes, but I dislike shoving my head under them to line up my shoes along the wall. Also, there is zero room for a full-sized hamper in here, and I do not like to keep my dirty clothes in the bedroom. For these two reasons, I often just throw my shoes and laundry directly onto the floor of the closet. Gross.
Here is the plan for the back wall:
The plan takes advantage of the vertical space above the upper shelf. There are a full 31 inches there. Also, I do have a narrow 8″ hamper that will fit nicely in the back corner.
First things first, I will give the entire closet a fresh coat of paint. Then, using scrap wood from the basement, I will build the new cubbies and shelves. Andy gave me a Kreg Jig (affiliate link) for Christmas, and I have been itching to use it for something. This is the perfect project.
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Tell me about your closets. Are you a compulsive organizer? A piler? Somewhere in between? Perhaps we can troubleshoot a solution together.
Housekeeping Notes
Yesterday, I sent out the first podcast update newsletter. If you signed up via the link at the very top of the page, and you did not get the email, let me know. Be sure to check your spam folder first.
Also, I would love it if my pictures with drawings and texts like the one above did not look like childish renderings. If you know of some software that would make the images look more professional, please let me know. In the meantime, thank you for putting up with that hot mess.
18 Comments
Berry
Do you do seasonal clothing migration? And how much “long” clothing do you have? (ie, could you take part of your long clothing section and build shoe cubbies in by the dresser?)
I’d be inclined to semi-gut your closet (leaving the dresser) and take full advantage of the height for hanging clothing. Put up a high bar for out of season clothing and a lower bars at staggered heights for in season. I might also set up a pegboard wall on the left side, or add more hooks for hanging things. (oh, and consider some sort of clear cover for your shoe cubbies for less worn shoes to save on dusting.)
Tbh, if I was doing a total gut job, I’d move the built in dresser to the center back, build cubbies above it, put a hamper on the left side and a bar well above the hamper for long clothing. Then I’d build a short row of shoe cubbies along the floor and hang a double row of bars along the right side. Moving the dresser would be work and pain though, depending on how it is built in.
Berry
Also, how deep is the left? I was assuming 3-4inches at most, but if you have 6 or 7 inches
http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/10031987/ or something similar might be a good show storage option for you. (I love http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/20169559/ more, but it requires 11″ and I doubt you have that without going into the wall space.) This one is 6″ https://www.containerstore.com/s/closet/shoe-storage/drawers/3-drawer-shoe-cabinet/123d?productId=10029305 and nicer than the ikea ones slim ones.
Stacy
To answer your question, between the dresser and the wall there are 21 inches! Thank you for the links. They are helpful.
Berry
I was thinking the flat wall across from the dresser. I couldn’t tell if it was flat to the door, or if there is a shallow depression in from the door. I tend to organize my shoes by common wear/seasonal vs worn less than once every two weeks. So I want the shoes I grab daily to be in a super easy by the door area, and my less worn ones can go at stepladder or “dig around” areas. (If I don’t make it easy, my shoes all end up on the floor and under my desk…) I live near Houston, so my boots make it into the daily area for maybe 2 months of the year.
Stacy
Unfortunately, there is not enough room. As it is, there is only a reasonable amount of space for me to stand in front of the dresser and pull out the drawers. I can use the vertical space. I will likely hang my running medals and anything that I do not have to reach often.
Stacy
I do not rotate seasonal clothing. I just keep a minimal amount of clothing for each season plus some dressy wear for social events. I keep a nice long coat and a few dresses which fall into the long clothing category.
For this project, I won’t be gutting the closet. I will probably put a pegboard or cubbies in that section on top of the dresser. I’ll take a peek at Ikea. (Thanks for the reminder!) Unfortunately, I have to drive to Canada if I want to shop there, but if the item is perfect, I’m up for the trip. 🙂
Linda Holder
I’m an organizer. Steve and I share a long master closet. He gets one side and I get the other—and I admit, my space is larger?. I hang short stuff (takes up most room) and and then on to pants and skirts and longer stuff. I use skirt/slack hangers that hold 4-6 pair per hanger. It gives me lots more space. The area for the short stuff has an upper and lower hanging bar that allowed me to utilize the space beneath the top rack.
My ‘shorter stuff’, I arrange by color—ROY G BIV….and within each color it goes from short sleeves to long sleeves and turtle necks.
My closet has a 3 foot section that is all cubbies. I love it for sweaters, workout gear and hats. There is a long shelf over the hanging area and I use this for out of season shoes (in labeled boxes), additional hats, boots and backpacks/totes. The bottom 2 cubby areas are for in season shoes and a place to drop my current workout bag.
We opted for a built in hamper in our master bath, so no need for a hamper in the closet.
Stacy
The fact that you are an organizer does not surprise me! 🙂 Your closet sounds like a thing of beauty.
Chad
Putting the hamper in the closet, why didn’t I think of that? I’m using a hamper that looks, unsurprisingly, like it came out of a teenage boy’s room.
When I laid out my closets and kitchen most of my stuff had been boxed for about 5 years and I had no idea what I owned, and then I stuffed them with construction detritus and do one good bout per year of going through things to get myself to normal person levels. The last one will be the linen closet, which was supposed to be one of my 30 projects in 30 days and has been emptied into the back bedroom closet since September.
For renderings, I use Sketchup and leave everything in 2D. If I really wanted to put effort into it I could figure out 3D modeling but for something like this an elevation will do the trick. I illustrated the changes to my stairway wall by printing the picture out and drawing by hand on it. It looks much better that way than in Paint.
Stacy
I would rather have a pile of dirty laundry on my closet floor than a hamper in my bedroom. I am weird. I’m picturing your hamper as the pop-up mesh type. 🙂 Am I close?
I have Sketchup. I should give it a shot! My photo is an embarrassment.
If you leave your closet project long enough, it will be September again. 😉
Liz
My husband and I share a closet and we just installed an elfa closet from The Container Store. Its wonderful. I did have a laundry sorting system that all the elfa people loved…I have more vertical space than horizontal, so I have three square shaped plastic laundry baskets that all hang vertically on the wall. I can sort the clothes when I throw them into a hamper (whites, darks, greens and grays). Then I can pull the hamper from the wall, and walk it over to the laundry closet in the hallway. Previously we did have a laundry sorter in our basement (we had a 1930s era house and it had a laundry shoot – best invention ever!) so I would sort in a three-canvas bag sorter (I think I bought it at Target) that sat near the washer and dryer. Good luck!
Stacy
I have heard such good things about the Elfa systems. Lucky you! I’m trying to picture your laundry sorter, but I cannot quite understand. I have seen a horizontal sorter but never a vertical one. Do you have a link?
Liz
I just sent you a photo in Instagram. I don’t have a blog. 🙁
Stacy
I got it! ?
Christine
We also have an unusual amount of storage in our old house, but none of it is original. Former owners took pity on the future and put in some great built-ins over the years. I’m looking forward to seeing what you build for your shoes! We have a couple of different places where we could build in some small storage to be a bit more efficient with our space.
Stacy
I love built-in, original or retrofitted. Even though the storage is not always as flexible as the storage in furniture, I like the permanence. To me, built-ins elevate a room.
Christine
I also like the permanence of built-in storage. Some of ours were built out of old pieces of the house (using tongue and groove boards or old window frames), so I guess that is almost as original as you can get with retrofits.
Stacy
Wow! That’s cool. What a perfect retrofit.