two clotheshorses + one closet

It might be hard to believe, but until we built our home this past year, Page and I had never shared a closet. That’s right – more than four years of marriage, and we still had a lot to learn about sharing a space.

So while our master closet is a decent size (certainly for one, anyway) it is not HUGE and it will take some extra thought and planning to make it work as efficiently as possible for both of us. We do keep off-season clothes in the guest room closet, and I keep my purse collection elsewhere, as does Page with his sports gear. Yet, even with all of those reductions, anyone who knows Page or me knows we like our clothes.

So call this the “before” closet post – the above photo is from the week we moved in. Basic white wire shelving all around the closet. I instantly saw it installed and thought the setup was stupid – but it was one of those things I didn’t stop to focus on during the build when there were much bigger decisions being made than shelving. Once the clothes were hung, it closed in quickly, since clothes are hanging on three sides:

This “surrounded” effect made the closet seem so much smaller, and it was harder to back up a bit and see what you were trying to look at. We also need more shelving and drawers. We have plenty of hanging clothes, but our work and play dress codes are more casual than formal – and we had some hanging space to spare.

It’s nearly impossible to photograph a closet, but here are some extreme fisheye views to give you a better idea. I’ve moved everything hanging to one side of the closet to get a feel for how much wall space we have to work with for some shelving/drawers once I rip out the extra racks.

We’ve made a few steps in squeezing extra space out of this closet. We hung an Ikea “Lack” shelf on the smallest wall to hold perfumes/colognes, makeup, Page’s collection of watches, and other accessories. We also hung a series of racks behind the door for things that hang flat and still allow us to swing the door open completely: ties, belts, scarves, and baseball caps.

These small changes definitely helped create a home for a bunch of our stuff, but there are still much-needed updates to come in here. So, in short, our closet needs to change in these ways:

Shelf space to accomodate “overflow” from our not-so-storage-friendly bathroom: cologne and perfume bottles, makeup, as well as accessories like watches, belts, hats, ties, etc.
Drawers to corral the overflow of folded things from our dressers, primarily t-shirts, workout clothes, leggings, swimsuits, and loungewear
Flat surfaces to store folded, non hanger-friendly items like sweaters
Shoe storage for nicer shoes (mostly my heels/dressy boots) that don’t get worn often, therefore don’t reside in the shoe storage of our garage

I’ve already started my research – I browsed Ikea, Target, and a local closet-planning store to see what my options are, but haven’t found a whole lot I love. This weekend my mom and I will make it to The Container Store and see what solutions they might have to offer as well. Like all other projects in our house, we are sticking to a budget and not going crazy, and I’m not tied to any one idea. I could see us doing something freestanding like the series of drawers shown here…

…or even finding a tall/narrow dresser to fit the wall, although I like that with these, you can see what’s inside each compartment. I also like the idea of something mounted on the wall and doing a combo of open shelves and drawers….