Organizing Your Closet
This is part of our series on Building a Capsule Wardrobe. In this post we'll be talking about organizing your closet.
Half the battle when getting dressed in the morning is just being able to see everything you have in in your closet, to create an outfit. If your closet is unorganized or cluttered, you may have all the building blocks of a great outfit right in front of you, but you won't be able to identify them. By organizing your closet, you can take the stress out of getting dressed and instead feel relaxed and even excited when you go to put on something to wear.
Here are three ways to organize your closet, so that it's beautiful and easy to find things.
SEASONAL STORAGE
As we mentioned in the last blog post, 5 Steps to Cleaning Out Your Closet, the goal is to be able to reach into your wardrobe blindfolded and pull out something that you will love to wear (right now). If it's winter and you have a bunch of white pants and bright maxi dresses cluttering your closet, store them away in a dresser or under the bed. If you can't do that, give them their own separate section in your closet. This way you won't stare into your closet confounded every morning, trying to dig through a bunch of inappropriate items to find something to wear.
ORGANIZE BY CATEGORY & OCCASION
It's easy to look into your closet and see a sea of clothes, and not know where to start. By organizing everything by category (ie tops vs dresses) and occasion (ie dressy vs casual), you can find what you're looking for faster.
One way to organize tops as follows: tank tops first, then t-shirts, then casual short sleeve tops, then dressy short sleeve or 3/4 sleeve tops, then long sleeve tops. That way you can see them all, because the smallest tops are in front, and everything is easy to find. For bottoms, keep jeans in one stack in a drawer and dressier pants in another stack (or hanging). For dresses, organize by casual first, then dressy, then formal.
You can also organize by color if you prefer. Whatever helps you find things faster, see everything in your closet, and get dressed more easily.
BE CREATIVE WITH ACCESSORIES STORAGE
If you have accessories like scarves, hats, or shoes taking up closet space or drawer space, use some of these closet hacks to free up that space. Some of our favorite ideas are:
1. Store seasonal accessories under the bed (like scarves, beanies, or flip flops).
2. Create a DIY jewelry hanger on the wall. It's frees up space and looks cute too!
3. Put a shoe rack or belt organizer on the back of the door.
4. Install a sliding belt rack.
5. Create a scarf hanger using shower curtain hooks or a towel bar.
To visualize these ideas and more, check out our Closet Organization Tips Pinterest board.
This is part of our series on Building a Capsule Wardrobe. Here is the full list of posts in this series:
4 - Align your closet to your lifestyle
5 - Design your ideal capsule wardrobe
9 - Shop thoughtfully
PS - We'd love for you to keep reading, and download our free worksheet below to follow along. It’s a great asset to print out and keep handy as you're building your wardrobe!
