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Lisa Barnes couldn't bear it anymore. After years of cramming more and more clothes, shoes and sports gear into the tiny bedroom closet she shared with her husband, Kevin, she was fed up with stumbling over sandals or pulling out a skirt or shirt only to find it was a wrinkled mess. So she called in a professional closet organizer for some drastic help.
The result is a rebuilt bedroom, featuring a veritable palace of a closet, measuring 1.8 m x 2 m (6 ft by 7 ft). The new walk-in closet feels more like a dressing room than a storage place. It contains wooden shelves for sweaters and T-shirts (his on the left, hers on the right), hanging rods to accommodate shirts, jackets and pants, as well as a few nifty extras, such as belt rods made of polished chrome and stainless steel that can be tucked away when not in use.
Considering how the closet has helped to organize her life, Lisa considers its $4,500 cost to be a bargain. She especially likes a pair of custom-built pull-out drawers that manage to accommodate all of her husband's designer footwear in compact comfort. "That's truly amazing considering he has 30 pairs of size 12 shoes," says Lisa.
Like the Barneses, many of us are finding that closets built for the 1950s or '60s can't live up to the demands of a 21st-century lifestyle — or wardrobe. If that describes you, here's how you, too, can find the space you need for the clothes you love:
Set priorities
"Most people wear 20% of their clothes 80% of the time," says Margarita Ibbott, a professional organizer with Downshifting at Home in London, Ont. If you can't fit everything into your closet, the easiest solution is to identify the clothes you wear most, then purge or store everything else. While getting rid of little-worn but much loved articles of clothing can be hard to do on your own, the Professional Organizers in Canada website at OrganizersInCanada.com lists closet organizers who can help you. Count on paying $45 to $85 an hour to have one of these pros organize your existing closet. Whipping a standard closet into shape should cost you about $800, including half a day of an organizer's time as well as the cost of any shelving, rods or drawers that need to be installed.
Consider ready-mades
Many manufacturers offer pre-built systems that let you make the most of whatever space you have. Organized Interiors (OrganizedInteriors.com) in Toronto, for instance, offers a Smart Line system of hangrods and shelves for around $1,000. It's bolted to the wall of a bedroom and can be arranged in several configurations that you can adjust as your needs change. You can hang two rods on top of one another in a child's room, for example, then as your child grows and her clothes grow, you can remove one of the rods or move it to a different position.
California Closets of Toronto (CaliforniaClosets.com) offers a variety of shelving units and drawers that can be mixed and matched to create the closet of your dreams, usually against a little-used bedroom wall. "These closets have a door enclosure and are about two feet deep," says marketing manager Sandra Dugas. "You can make them large or small, depending on space." Look at paying about $200 a linear foot for these units. Drawers and special finishes cost extra.
Go Hollywood
If, like the Barneses, you're fortunate enough to have a sizable bedroom, consider adding a custom-built walk-in closet. The average cost for one of these Hollywood-style refuges is $3,500 to $10,000, depending on size and finishes.
Of course, all that extra space means there's room for luxurious features such as a pull-out ironing board for last-minute touch-ups ($60), special shoe drawers ($400 for a drawer that holds 12 pairs of shoes) and easy-to-reach jewelry drawers ($300).
The possibilities don't end there. "One of my clients asked for a full-length mirror with a small bench in front of it so that she could sit down comfortably when putting on shoes," says Enrico Tersigni of Organized Interiors. "When you flip open the top of the bench, it reveals a hidden laundry hamper." Another favorite touch is a stainless steel valet rod ($75) that pulls out to hold various items of clothing. It's a great little aid if you're trying to decide between a few different looks. "Kevin loves his," says Lisa Barnes. "You can hang suits, ties and shirts on it to see what suits looks best with what accessories. That way, Kevin doesn't need me holding up his suit all the time to pick out the right tie or shirt in the morning."
Tersigni's personal favorite among all the options he's seen? "That would have to be what I had designed for my own house," he says. "Our walk-in closet has an island in the centre that hides a laundry chute. You can stuff dirty clothes items down it and they go straight to the laundry room downstairs. That way, the room stays clean, tidy and odorfree all the time." Now that's a man after my own heart.
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