Total Closet Remodel

TL;DR: A closet remodel is one of the best gifts I have ever given myself.

You may remember how I used the January Cure to emotionally cope with the Omnicron lockdown. One of my major projects was to reorganize my closet. Don’t remember the very large crack in my sanity? That’s ok – here are some shots of the aftermath.

The results were fine. Sort of. Over time, I ran into a few things that were just unsolvable through good old reorganization and purging.

• My neatly stacked sweaters went right back into a jumbled mess. (Sweaters are like that.)
• Same thing happened to my pants – just not as quickly.
• I never felt like I had enough space for shoes (and I was unwilling to purge any further).
• There were still tubs of seasonal clothes under the bed.
• I hated how my hamper took up so much space in my closet.
• And finally, there was just something sub-optimal about my morning flow, which required me to go in and out of the closet – from closet to dresser- to get all my things together. This was problematic because CJ works Singapore hours, so my rustling around in the dresser and opening and closing the closet door several times was not helpful for his sleep.

So after creatively reorganizing the closet a few more times, we finally decided on a total closet remodel.

Selecting a Vendor

After doing all the requisite research we landed on The Custom Closet Company. They checked all of the important boxes for us.

• Super local! They are in Auburn, which is only a few minutes away from us. (Shopping local and small has been a passion for years.)
• Family owned. After owning and operating the frozen custard shop for several years, we have an even deeper appreciation of small, family-owned businesses, and strive to support them whenever we can.
• The reviews were stellar! Most customers gave The Custom Closet Company shining ratings – and the few minor complaints I found were easy to toss into the category of “eh, sometimes shit happens”.

Closet Remodel Design Phase

This phase of my closet remodel was super fun! The rep was on time and professional. He asked me questions about what I liked and didn’t like about my current closet, and got really specific about what I was hoping to achieve with a remodel. Then he pulled out a tape measure and I got out of the way!

About a half hour later, the designer came downstairs to walk through the cad drawings.

Through this phase, I learned there were a few things that made our closet (and us) unique. First, optimizing a walk-through closet is a bit trickier than a walk-in. (You have to walk through our master closet to get from the bedroom the the bathroom.) Second, having a window in the closet is a super nice perk, but also poses a design challenge. Third, our closet is not square – it doesn’t even pretend to be square – with one wall being awkwardly taller than the other – and that doesn’t even take the duct work into account. And finally, I have WAY more dresses (and jumpsuits!) than most people, so I require quite a lot of tall hanging space.

But no matter! The cad drawings solved all of these issues! We even included a built in hamper to get it off the floor, which resulted in having to significantly raise the tall hanging bar so that dresses could hang above it. (If we ever sell our home to someone shorter than 5’7, they’ll need to change that. Ha!)

The Construction

Once I had a design in hand, I wanted my new closet immediately! I mean…who wouldn’t? However, due to scheduling and labor, I had to wait almost TWO WHOLE MONTHS to get my closet. So when the day finally came, I was ready. I pulled every little thing out of the closet so that they would have nothing in their way. It was kind of hilarious to see all our clothes stacked on the bed. (I’m now regretting that I didn’t take a photo!)

The construction of the closet took a little less than a day! The Custom Closet Company showed up a little after 10pm and were done around 4:30, minus a few odds and ends that would need to be addressed at a later date – like trim, installing the valet, and the door for the hamper cabinet. When they drove away, I was immediately able to hang all our clothing in the BRAND NEW CLOSET.

Closet Remodel Reveal

It turns out that effectively photographing small is really difficult, but I think this captures the spirit of the dramatic change.

This has been a complete game-changer! My mornings and evenings have become so dang easy and pleasant that I wonder how I even survived till now. (A bit dramatic, you say? Nah…have we met?)

All my closet woes are gone! Things stay tidy, there’s plenty of room for everything, and ALL my clothes are now in the closet – there’s no seasonal storage under the bed! Oh! And the hamper is off the floor and in it’s own little cabinet!

And let me show you my favorite little bonus feature. It’s called a valet. It sits discretely on the inside of my shoe rack and it is magical.

Every evening before bed, I hang up my outfit for the next day so that I am able to stumble into my closet in the morning, throw on my pre-planned outfit, and then groggily do bathroom things. And somehow, I manage to look human most days!

Yeah…so closet remodel. It’s made life easer and I love it. I’ll do a follow up post in the near(ish) future about some of the smaller organizational bins.