Two women sharing one closet is hard. Two women sharing one closet that was designed to be a broom closet is basically a 1980s bad comic standing punchline. So it’s time to fix that. Here’s how we transformed this Hers and Hers storage to make sense for both of us:

If you missed the last three weeks of the Spring 2021 One Room Challenge, I encourage you to go back and read about how we built this entire space from scratch after our house was hit by a tornado (here) and how we settled on a really crisp color palette based in neutrals (here) and how we’re planning to make this bedroom and bathroom very fun (here).

Last week, we left one another with a design plan for the bedroom and bathroom. It’s tweaked a little since then so here’s the updated concept board + purchase list:

The bathroom has gotten a seriously bold update to the design over the past week. Once we got the black and white accents in, we realized the space was feeling a little stiff. So we’ve added more color and natural wood to the design.

And since I’m going so bold in the rooms, I decided to tone down the closet design. But first, here’s the closet when we started:

Originally, this space was supposed to be a very small guest room closet. That’s the really skinny part you see (second photo). It was originally designed as a reach-in and the door access was going to be father towards the exterior wall.

The wider part (first photo) was meant to be a hall closet with shelving for spare linens and outlet access for rechargeable vacuums and small appliances. The door would have originally been perpendicular to our bedroom door (in the hallway).

Once we realized we were going to be occupying this bedroom (our bedroom was originally downstairs), it became clear that we would need more than just a sliver of closet space for both our clothing and shoe needs.

Since we love our shoes and have a hard time finding room to store them, we decided the best plan for this narrow spot in the closet, which we need for the door to be able to open (more on that later, would be to add shelving to the back wall to accommodate the majority of our kick.

I used the same method to build these shelves that you see here to create built-in wall shelving for our shoes and accessories.

Since we don’t have a ton of hanging clothes and both of us are relatively short, I opted to lower the closet rod and add more shelving above for more storage capacity.

The small dressers will allow for additional folded clothing storage and easier casual shoe (think sandals) storage.

Here’s the finished product:

Here’s how the shoes are stored inside the little dresser:

I’ve added an additional dresser to the bedroom where I house all my folded clothing.

And a secret storage hack that I’ll give more details on next week when we talk about furniture (hint: it’s the bed)

Finally, we added a door to the closet! We’ve lived in this house for nine months without a closet door. It was time.

There was no clearance for the inswing of a door in this floorplan so we needed to be creative. I know a lot of people like the look of a hanging glide rail track but I really don’t. I think they feel a little more industrial than I typically like.

But I did actually find one in a white finish that I could live with and opted to hang it inside the closet so it didn’t become a focal point of the room.

We reused one of the original doors to the house. It’s so perfectly imperfect. We even kept the original backplate for the door knob which has been painted over and over again. We’re using this as a finger glide since a traditional door knob would be too deep to fit behind the wall:

It’s so nice being able to close the door and not having to stare at clothes in my bedroom. I’m loving this upgrade.

Next week, I’m going to show you the other storage upgrades this room is getting. We’re talking furniture that serves double purposes. Because when you have a small house, every item must carry its own weight in functionality.

In the meantime, please go check in on the other Designers and their ORC rooms by clicking here:

Until then, stay safe and sane.

xoxo
Teri

DECORATING ON A BUDGET ISN’T ALWAYS EASY BUT I’M HERE TO HELP.

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