15 Minute Organizing – The Coat Closet
The Coat Closet
There are so many small organizing projects that you can do quickly. To give you some ideas for quick projects, I am starting a series of posts that will get you more organized and then maintain the order.
The Coat Closet - Space for shoes, boots, baskets for hats, gloves, and scarves Share on XA while back I wrote about storage ideas for your most-used coats. What I didn’t tell you in that post is that we hang most of our coats on hooks out of necessity. Our coat closet is tiny and can’t hold more than 8 coats. Not enough for a family of 4 – forget guests’ coats. If you are lucky enough to have a large closet, organizing it can be a great, quick project.
Here are ideas from Pinterest.
This closet from Deliciously Organized makes great use of the floor for storage. Space for shoes, boots, baskets for hats, gloves, and scarves. I love it! I often suggest people use the back of the closet door to store often-used items.
Another note on coat closets. Sometimes the best quick fix you can do in this space is to get some good strong wooden hangers. Some winter coats are heavy and need the extra support that a strong hanger offers. They will protect your coats from a lot of wear & tear as well.
A little creativity goes a long way in a small space.
Sort, Purge, Group, Contain, Maintain.
What’s in your coat closet? Read Tracy’s post for some more ideas.
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Janet Schiesl
Janet has been organizing since 2005. She is a Certified Professional Organizer and the owner of Basic Organization.
She loves using her background as a space planner to challenge her clients to look at their space differently. She leads the team in large projects and works one-on-one with clients to help the process move quickly and comfortably. Call her crazy, but she loves to work with paper, to purge what is not needed and to create filing systems that work for each individual client.
Janet is a Past Board Member of the National Association of Productivity and Organizing Professionals and a Past President of the Washington DC Chapter of NAPO were she has been named Organizer of the Year and Volunteer of the Year.
Janet Schiesl
Janet has been organizing since 2005. She is a Certified Professional Organizer and the owner of Basic Organization.
She loves using her background as a space planner to challenge her clients to look at their space differently. She leads the team in large projects and works one-on-one with clients to help the process move quickly and comfortably. Call her crazy, but she loves to work with paper, to purge what is not needed and to create filing systems that work for each individual client.
Janet is a Past Board Member of the National Association of Productivity and Organizing Professionals and a Past President of the Washington DC Chapter of NAPO were she has been named Organizer of the Year and Volunteer of the Year.
I also use wooden hangers in my coat closet. You are so right when you say that winter coats are heavy and need a more supportive hanger. In addition to a rod, I have a couple of easy to access shelves. I store baskets up there for hats, scarves, and gloves. I love those accessories and have lots of them. A basket is the best way for me to keep them under control and off the floor!
Yes, baskets are so great. It sounds like you have a very organized coat closet!
Like you, we have a tiny coat closet. It’s great for the two of us and even a few guests. To maximize the space, I have hooks on the inside of the door to accommodate additional jackets, an elfa four bin cabinet to hold gloves, hats, scarves, etc., and a shelf above the rod that has a few boxes holding gifts to give and some memorabilia (letters and cards received.)
When we have large gatherings, we set up a foldable coat rack for people to hang their coats. That works out great!
Hooks on the back of the door and a foldable coat rack for events are great ideas!
We leave our “everyday” coats on hooks in cubbies, and keep out of season and dressy coats in the closet. We also have some shelves in there on which we store sunscreen, bug spray, umbrellas, bags, and sundry other items. A bit coat closet was part of the addition we did to our house when we renovated. It is a luxury, so I greatly appreciate it!
You have a great system and congrats on the upgrade, I’m sure it makes winter season easier.
Our coat closet definitely wasn’t designed to hold more than a few winter coats! The upside is that we have to abide by the “one in, one out” rule to ensure we don’t run out of space.
That’s a great way to look at it! Keeps you honest with the in and out rule.
My coat closet is tiny, but there’s only one of me, so it suits my needs. It’s downstairs, right by the front door, while the rest of my home is upstairs. One wall of the closet shares an outside wall, which means my coats are *cold* during the winter, while (because heat rises) my home generally stays toasty. So, although I store most of my coats in the coat closet, whatever everyday jacket or coat I’m wearing in the coldest months tends to live on the back of a chair, so I never have to put on a cold coat.
The coat closet is neat and organized by coat type (light jacket, rain coat, winter coat) but the truth is that 9 or 10 months out of the year, I wear no jacket or just my denim jacket. So, the random unhoused coat doesn’t lead to clutter, and the coat closet rarely gets mussed enough to warrant a second look. It’s an atypical use, and not at all how I encourage clients to downsize their coat closets and use them for outerwear, but it works.
Finding a system that works for you is the key, even if it isn’t the standard you’d suggest. Putting on cold coats in the winter is no fun, I’m glad you found a way to avoid that.