Scene: you finally hang up your dress pants…and can barely jam them in between the crammed hangers in your closet. You finally wedge them in when – crap – a dress falls off and onto the floor, joining dust bunnies and other recalcitrant clothes. You sigh, close the door, and put as much distance between yourself and the disaster of a closet as possible.

Sound familiar? It’s all too common to struggle with closet organization. Having a gorgeous, boutique-like closet doesn’t have to cost a fortune, and it can make a huge difference to how you feel about your room. A well-organized closet means you’ll put your clothes away, leaving both your bedroom and your closet looking calm and peaceful. Here’s how to get started.

Sort Yourself Out!

Well, not yourself, but your clothes. What should you keep, and what should you toss? You can’t organize your closet properly if you’re trying to fit too much in, and you won’t feel good about the space if it’s full of albatrosses. There’s two good ways to approach this: first, the long-term method. Hang all your clothes backwards (or, for folded items, put a piece of masking tape near the tag) and only hang them or take the tape off once it’s been worn. After three months, anything that hasn’t been worn is probably something that doesn’t fit, isn’t loved, or isn’t useful (formal wear and out-of-season clothing excepted, of course!).

Second, the purge. Take every single item out of your closet and over the course of a few hours or few days, go through each thing and ask yourself (Marie Kondo-style) if it gives you joy – you get to interpret what that looks like to you. If the answer is yes, it gets to go back in the closet and be treated nicely. If the answer is no? Thank it, and let it go.

Out of Season Clothes and Shoes

You don’t need twelve months worth of clothing out during the entire year. In a part of the world where we have four seasons, you probably don’t need tank tops in January or sweaters in July. Pack them away into a suitcase, since it’s taking up storage room anyway.

Quick Tips

• If you have sliding doors, just take them off. Worried your closet will just look cluttered if you do that? It’ll force you to stay tidier! And, it will be way easier to fit everything.
• Shelves > drawers. Drawers hide everything that isn’t sitting right on top. Ideal stack height per shelf is just three items – talk about an argument for minimalism!
• If you do have to have drawers, instead of stacking the contents, try folding things so that they’re lined up like folders in a filing cabinet.

Of course, all this organizing is a lot easier when you have the right ratio of shelves, shallow drawers, shoe racks, and hangers. Stuck with a single shelf and rod? Call Perfect Fit today at 403-768-3051 for your FREE in-home consultation!