Hello, my name is Jenna. This is my closet.
Oh wait–that’s the futon covered in a mess of clothes.
Wait a sec . . .
. . . let’s see . . .
. . . okay, here’s my closet!
Yes. My achy-breaky closet. There is no rhyme or reason to it. When I first moved my apparel into it two years ago, I had a plan: skirts were on the left. Then came pants. Shirts and sweaters to the right, and dresses to the far right. But as time progressed, the organization became haphazard. One might say it came under the Rule of Misrule. Here’s the left side:
(love that grey sweater with the cable pattern down the sleeve, by the way–one of my finds at Plato’s last year that’s been a faithful staple)
And here’s the right side:
Skirt? Flowers? Stripes? Sweater? Orange! Electric blue! Whoop de doo!
Complete chaos, I’m telling you.
On a totally unrelated note, check out these shoes:
They’re from Target. They’re my favorite. After years pretending I hated pink, I finally matured and started admitting that I like pink. I’ve found new freedom in being a girl, and liking the things that sometimes girls like.
But shoes are not today’s topic!
So some things you may not know about me:
1) I really like clothes.
2) Clothes are pretty cool.
3) I like to wear them and not be naked.
4) I like to feel pretty when I’m wearing them and not being naked.
The problem is, if I happened to have a particular item in mind, I couldn’t aways find it in a timely fashion. So on one hapless Saturday when my husband was out of town, I decided to change my life. My sister Heidi had a lovely closet with all her clothes hung in an ordered rainbow of colors, which I had gazed up with wonder in Alaska–so why couldn’t I?
I started by flinging things around. That’s a good way to start any project. Hence the futon covered in stuff.
Yep, there it is again. Flinging things around makes one feel so dang productive, doesn’t it?
My next step was to start rehanging everything. I decided to start with black on the left, followed by grey and white, and kind of work my way into a spectrum of color.
This took about 2 1/2 hours. It would’ve taken much less, but I also used this time to purge (which requires trying something on 5 times before finally putting it in the discard pile), and to figure out how to combine my fall clothes. See, I forget how to layer in the June-September span and have to re-learn how to put everything together.
Down to the last few things . . .
It was fun. It was especially fun because no husband was around to enter the room and exclaim in horror “You have too many clothes! Burn the whole lot of ’em!” or something extreme like that.
We wouldn’t want that. Nope. Not that he would ever do or say that–but I don’t know if he realizes how much is actually in my closet.
Here’s the finished product!
A closer look at the black to white spectrum on the left side:
And a closer look at the more colorful spectrum on the right side:
Now when I open my closet I feel like I’m shopping in some kind of posh store. Opening the closet has become much more exciting. Finding that one dusty blue colored cardigan has become a cinch. I highly recommend this process.
Which brings me to this: what does your closet look like? If any of you are inspired to color-coordinate your closets and want to send me before and after pictures (or already have color-coordinated closets and want to share the beauty), I’ll put together a post with all the pics.
Hooray for organization! Hooray for clothes! Hooray for being a girl!
View Comments (24)
I did this a while back and loved it. Of course right now my clothes repertoire is severely limited by the fact that I am carrying all my weight in my "midsection". :-) But color coordinating also helped me see that what colors I had an abundance of, and what ones I needed to shop for some more! :-)
Jenna, the prospect of "flinging" clothes (whoop de doo!) has inspired me to color-coordinate my own closet. I've been meaning to do that for awhile (SO much simpler getting ready for work in the morning...), but your enthusiasm is contagious and I won't put it off any longer. LOVE those pink shoes! Will try to send pics...
omg Jenna, if you saw my 'closet' you would DIE. I'm not even kidding. Maybe I'll purge and organize.. someday..
Nice work!! Looks great. I am really excited to reorganize once the new furniture arrives... Let the color coordinating begin!! And purging. I LOVE to purge. Amen.
Do you mean your new bedroom furniture, or is there more fun I need to know about??
new furniture? new furniture? Do Tell All!
Hey Jenna!
You certainly have a lot, a lot , a lot of clothes!
A lovely post! ;)
Heh heh--I'm just here to make everyone else feel better about the states (and fullness) of their closets. =)
My closet measures 2 inches by an 4 inches so I don't bother organizing it. I can see everything in it at a glance b/c there's nowhere to look. I look forward to a day when I have enough space that requires organization. Your work really paid off--it looks so nice now!
So basically you can only fit, like, one shirt in your closet. =)
nice job!
What goodness a bit of flinging can lead to!
I don't have so many clothes as you (lucky) thing, but I can attest to the joy of a good spot of organisation, as we recently had new wardrobes. Nice big proper wardorbes that will fit all our things, instead of old second-hand/ inherited ones that wouldn't have been our choice. Yay for being able to find what to wear. Simple joy.
Rx
Simple joy is absolutely right! Organization does the heart worlds of good.
The lover of black & white (& all the grays in between) in me rejoices at the sight of the left half of your closet! Looks fabulous :)
You know me--I can never get enough black and white . . . though I've been improving in recent years and really beefing up on my pinks/magentas/purples!
Good job! :)