The Christmas season has drawn to an end and the after-Christmas sales are slowly down quite a bit. If you're like me, your closet is overflowing because it's packed and messy and you're not willingly to get rid of much. Don't worry, there are solutions! Clean and organize your closet with these easy steps so your clothes are all visible and it stays that clean forever!
1. Don't Stack in Drawers
If you have drawers full of clothes, keep them neat longer but putting them in rows! Don't fold them flat and then stack them on top of each other; you'll just dig through them the next day, messing them up again. Fold them up small and stand them up next to each other in rows so you can easily see all of your shirts in your drawers and grab the one you want to wear!
2. Backwards Hangers
At the beginning of the year, school year, or season (whatever you want your cycle to be) turn all of your hangers backward. Then, when you wear something and hang it back up, put it on normally again. At the end of the year, get rid of everything that's still on a backward hanger! This is a great way to clear out your closet and see what you actually wear versus what you just tell yourself you wear.
3. Sell/Donate
Okay, so you've taken down the backward hangers and the clothes that used to hang on them...now what? You just have bags of clothes sitting on your floor now, right? No! Sell or donate your unwanted clothes! Filter through ones that have holes or tears and aren't wearable anymore first, of course! You can take your clothes to sell to your local consignment shops, such as Plato's Closet, or you can sell your clothes from your own front yard by having a yard sale! Neither is guaranteed to get rid of all of it for you, but it'll make you some extra cash!
Your other option is to donate to a charity such as the most popular Goodwill or Salvation Army. Of course, there are probably plenty of other local charities around that you could donate to as well! Do your research and find one that lines up with your values, I'm sure anyone would love your donations!
4. Turn Every Other Shoe
When stacking your shoes either on your floor or in a shoe rack, you have to be smart. To save space, turn every other shoe so you can squeeze as many pairs into your area as possible! This method also helps you see the shoe from all angles, so if you aren't feeling an open back shoe that day, you can easily avoid picking one out! It also helps to save room if you stack your sandals or flats directly on top of each other.
5. Hang Accessories
Buy scarf or belt hangers like this one from Bed, Bath, and Beyond. Instead of cluttering your closet with belts and scarves lying around, put them on a hanger and hang them up! It doesn't take up much more space than a normal article of clothing and it's not nearly as much of an eyesore!
6. Have a System
If you don't have some kind of system for how your clothes are hanging in your closet, it's going to be extremely difficult to pick outfits. Color-code it, like in the picture above! Red, pink, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, white, black. This make it easy so if you have pants or a jacket to match that only match one or two colors, you can easily see your narrowed-down options!
You can also keep clothing items together by season! Hang the winter items on one side and the summer items on the other!
By occasion is good, as well. Keep dresses separate from T-shirts and activewear separate from those!
Another way to organize is by style! Keep jackets and coats in one section, T-shirts in another, dresses in the next, button-ups all together, etc.
Any combination of all of these systems would work the best!
7. Fold Similar Pieces
Jeans aren't an item that need to be hung and take up space in your closet for two reasons. One, jeans aren't going to wrinkle easily, and if you wear tight jeans, the wrinkles will be gone by the time you put them on anyway. Two, jeans are fairly similar, so if you need them for your outfit, odds are you aren't going to need to try on both the dark wash and super dark wash to decide which is better. You can just grab a pair and throw them on. So, stack them up on shelves or in drawers with the method in number 1!
8. Hide Out-of-Season Clothes
Don't waste space in the summer by leaving your sweaters in your closet in full-view and don't waste the valuable room in the winter leaving out your shorts and crop tops. Invest in a cedar chest or some storage bins and put away your out-of-season clothes, only to return them when the season rolls around again. This goes for shoes, too! You aren't wearing sandals in the winter or fur boots in the summer, put them away, maybe even just under your bed in a bin, until the weather calls for them!
9. Set Aside Clothes for Weight Goals
Do you have some clothes that are just a little too tight or a bit too big? Are you determined to make it to your desired weight to fit into those clothes? Don't toss them. Fold them and keep them on a shelf in your closet where you can see them. They'll be out of the way of your main wardrobe (since you can't wear them yet) but they'll also be in clear view to always keep you motivated to work towards your goal!
