Recently I moved from a 3,000 square foot home to a 1,000 square foot condo. My closet space changed dramatically. What I had in the house: (yes those are photos hanging on the wall of a closet, LOL!)
And the reality of what I have in the condo.
A closet redo was mandatory.
The first thing I did was try to emulate some of the features of my large walk in closet that I loved. Plenty of shoe shelves where I could actually see all my shoes, and drawer space that allowed me to keep handbags, scarves and other items that don't do well on shelves, neatly arranged and contained. To accomplish the drawer space, I opted for a free-standing IKEA item (Algot) that would mean I didn't have to install any special hanging hardware required for closet systems with drawers.
I intended to reuse the single, builder-grade metal shelving by moving it up higher and then planned to install another metal shelf midway down the wall, across half of the reach-in closet. Because I have installed a number of different closet systems in the past, I had learned that it takes quite a bit of time to install the wood type and the mounting rail style shelving, so it just made sense for me to go with the direct install variety that was already in place.
From here I began to sketch out what my closet needed to look like based on the number of items I own, length of items, types of items, etc. Then I made careful measurements of all of the elements needed, which basically boiled down to a kit, wall anchors and some end attachments that are sold at a big box home improvement store.
I installed the wall anchors and went to install the previously mentioned shelf that was put in by the builder. Turns out it was a different maker than what I bought and didn't fit the wall anchors, so I traipsed back to the big box and purchased an 8 foot long shelf that I then came home and cut with bolt cutters to fit the length of my closet. (quite a job because I am apparently weak and my cutters are lame).
For my shoes, I intended to build a shelf system from pre-cut wood boards. I purchased 8 precut 6" x 24" pine (I think?) boards that I found in the hobby section of same big box store and 4 precut 2.5" x 24" pieces as well to cut at home into 16 side supports for the shelves. To round things out I bought a giant box of wall anchors, paint supplies and the like. I already owned paint to match the trim, left behind by the former owner, so that I did not have to buy.
After measuring the depth of my closet I determined the walls were not squarely 24" deep as the original measurement read. So, had to shave off a bit of the ends on each shelf (and do this a couple of times later to adjust for each shelf. The further up the wall, the measurement continued to decrease.) I did all the measuring and cuts with a jigsaw in my air conditioned and carpeted living room. Ha!
Once the shelves were measured and cut, I used the width of the shelf to measure the appropriate width for the side supports. These were cut from the (4) 2.5" x 24" strips of matching wood. (4 resulting pieces from each of the 4=16, one for each end of 8 shelves to rest on)
Then I sanded and painted with 2 coats of trim paint, drilled holes in one of the pieces, then used it as a template for the other 15 end pieces. Following that I put in wall anchors where appropriate and screwed the supports into the anchors/wall. (ps-ask your local hardware store guy which anchors to use for your wall types. It depends on the material, I don't presume to be an expert on wall anchors, so do your homework on that so your shelves stay put over time.)
Next, the shelves were placed on each set of side supports and hot glued down. Yup. The woman's equivalent to duct tape. :-) NOTE: You may want to use something more substantial, like construction adhesive or nails.
This is the end result of the closet:
Starting to shelve the shoes...
Everything in its own place.
Okay, it's not as grand as my last closet, but my clothes and shoes can breathe now and I can easily get to everything. btw: I relocated the safe to another closet in my office which made possible the lower hanging shelf so the sleeves don't touch anything beneath them, and my kitty cats can hide there too!
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