We’ve all dealt with problems organizing our closet. It seems like no matter what we do or how much stuff we move around, there’s still never enough space, right?

Closets can be tricky beasts, and there’s a little more that goes into keeping them organized than you might initially expect. Instead of just tackling the entire thing at once, an easier way to keep everything straightened out and stop yourself from going crazy is to tackle each section of the closet on its own! Here’s a few suggestions for each part of the closet and what you can do to organize it:

The Floor
Sometimes you need to start at the bottom and work your way up. Odds are your floor is covered with shoes that need a home and other stuff that just can’t quite be hung up, like scarves and blankets. Start by clearing out the floor of your closet and see if anything can be stored anywhere else - those blankets might be able to go under the bed or in a linen closet, and the fur coat you only wear for special occasions could be hung up somewhere else (or stored in the basement, if the conditions are right). Everything else needs to be reorganized a little better - get some closet storage bins to hang onto the loose stuff, a closet shoe rack will always come in handy so long as you have room, and once the piles of stuff on your floor are a little neater you’ll find how much easier everything else is.

The Hanger
The focal point of any closet is the hanger, right? After all, that’s where the majority of your clothes are going to go while they’re hanging up, and this is the place of greatest clutter. One of the best ways to deal with hanger clutter is to take everything down and start re-sorting it. Off-season stuff can probably be moved elsewhere, anything that doesn’t fit (that you’re willing to part with) can be donated to charity, sold online, or given to someone, and everything else needs to be given a home. Organize by size, color, or type (overshirt, sweater, professional stuff, etc) and make sure you stick to your new system going forward to prevent it from getting messy all over again. (This, you can imagine, is easier said than done.)

The Shelves
Most closets are fortunate enough to have shelves, and a lot of times they wind up serving very...mixed purposes. Much like the hanger, take everything down off your shelves and see if it can go somewhere else - do you really still need the box your cable box came in, or can you toss that now? Will you ever wear that hat again? Where else can these ancient college textbooks go? From there, rearrange everything by size - books can get stacked on top of each other, things like hats and ties need their own little corner to keep them safe from wrinkles, and whatever you reach for less often needs to go higher up so your commonly-worn things can be on the lower shelves, safely within reach.

Of course, if your closet doesn’t have shelves in the first place, now might be a good time to set up some closet shelves, as this could solve a lot of your organizational problems right out of the gate.

The Door
The door is an overlooked asset to any organizational plan, and needs to be considered during any closet reorganization job. By getting over the door closet hangers and setting them on the back of your closet door, you can free up a lot of room that things like shoes used to take up. After all, isn’t the point of closet organization to have less clutter everywhere?

Looking for more tips? Check out our whole range of closet organizers and see what we can help you get straightened out!