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Thursday, September 1, 2016

INSIDE MY CLOSET and HOW TO COLOR CODE

   

  COLOR CODING!

Did you know that color coding your closet will help you keep it  more organized?

This is not a new concept, and it might not work for everyone, but I have been doing it for years. 

 via

It makes getting dressed so much easier as well.

There are certain steps that need to take place in order to have an organized, color coded closet.



STEP ONE


Categorize your clothing by types


Tops
Jackets
Pants
Skirts
Dresses
Coats



I take this one step further by sorting by the individual items by occasion…….



Casual
Dress
Fancy


Once you have categorized your clothing by type, and by what occasion you will be wearing it for, you will be ready to start color coding.


Everyone will have a different system. I know I differ from the most commonly recommended way to color code.



STEP TWO

COLOC       COLOR CODINGR CODING

Many professional organizers will use the following acronym?……



R-RED
O-ORANGE
Y-YELLOW
G-GREEN
B-BLUE
I-INDIGO
V-VIOLET




You will notice there is no, black, gray or white.

That is why I don’t color code in this order in my own personal closet. I have lots of black and white stripes in my closet.



All of the above images would be dream closets , wouldn't they? Most of us don't have this much space to store our clothing so we have to be more discerning on what we keep and what we get rid of.

 

In our new home and our previous home we have a small walk-in closet as seen above.

We need to put in closet organizer in our new closet and that is on our to-do list, so for now I will be using our previous homes closet as our example on how I go about organizing my closet.



First I categorize by….



Casual
Dressy
Fancy



Then I organize by type of clothing…..


TOPS


tank tops
sleeveless
short sleeves
long sleeve

BOTTOMS
Walking shorts
Long pants
Skirts
Dresses



The color order I use is……..

White
Cream
Black Solid
Black & White patterned,checks,stripes
Navy Solid
Navy checks,stripes
Light blue
Gray solid
Gray checked
Yellow
Green
Pink

 My closet is a walk-in, but narrow, and long so I can’t really get a good angle to shoot, but I will attempt to show you what I have done inside my closet....

 


On the top rack you will see my casual/dress tops.
Notice I keep all the sleeveless tops together and then graduate down to long sleeves.

The bottom rack starts our with my white jeans, blue jeans and then goes into the sleeveless knit tops to the short sleeve then the long.
 

I have found that color coding and hanging like items together helps me make decisions more easily when getting dressed. It also helps me maintain the organization for longer periods of time.


At the end of our closet I hang all of my dresses, dress pants and jackets. My lifestyle is more casual now that I no longer work so to be honest most of my wardrobe falls into the casual category.







My Husbands Clothing


AND

Yes I color code his clothing too. 

 AND

No he does NOT keep it that way. I am constantly putting his clothes back in order when I put away his laundry. It is so easy to do. When he does laundry he puts them away where he finds a hanger. Can't complain, at least he helps with the laundry.

We keep his suits and dress slacks and shirts in another closet in the guest room since he only accesses these pieces of clothing on rare occasions.

In the center divider I keep my tank tops and summer sweaters, flip flops and some of the shoes in boxes.





The shoes that I wear more often are kept on my hanging shoe rack. Over the years I have found that this is the easiest way for me to keep my every day shoes organized.....

 My flip flops are kept in a basket. This is what works for me. All of my dress, or out of season shoes are kept in boxes on, or under the shelves.


 In the summer months you will often see me in a baseball hat and pony tail. I kept them on hooks above a mirror. I also used hooks to hang some of my longer necklaces.

Over time I think we all find things that work for us or don't. I won't pretend that I keep my closet organized at all times because trust me I don't.



However I have found that so far, these methods have worked the best for me in the past.

This post was not just written for you my dear readers it was also written for ME as well.

I am trying to get up the gumption to organize our new home's walk-in closet. This post is a good reminder for me!!! 

 
I hope this has given you..... 
Ideas and inspiration!!!




























 
 

6 comments:

Sue said...

I organize mine similarly and it is in desperate need right now. I have a plan for one section that I would dearly love for my husband to build but he is not as project oriented in retirement as I'd like. �� Look forward to seeing your new space.

Riley said...

I have organized by color for years. It was the best decision I ever made. It's so easy to find what I want.

I do ROYGBIV, black, white. I do not sort by type of clothing. I don't have enough clothing to necessitate doing so.

If your followers have never tried the color sorted closet, I highly encourage it.

Lady of the Manor said...

Like Riley, I've sorted my clothes by color for quite sometime and it really does help keep my closet organized and its easy to find what I need. This is truly a great idea! The closet guys are putting the wire shelving in our new closets today so I hope to keep this post in mind when We finally move in. Thanks for all of the suggestions!

Victoria said...

I also hang my clothing by color, but I do not use the rainbow range. I hang mine based on intensity of similar colors. For example, first white, then cream, then tan followed by all the ranges of pink from light to dark and so on with all the greens, grays and blacks. This is done with all three quarter sleeves and long sleeves. I do the same with sleeveless and then short sleeves so that tops are organized by color and by sleeve length. My pants are arranged by color in a similar fashion. One fool-the-eye trick I learned from a rep from California Closets: hang pants on the upper bar and tops on the bottom bar. The pants don't stick out as far as tops so they make the closet look and feel less crowded. It works.

Shirley@Housepitality Designs said...

i have a rather small closet for the size of my home...so I do the same thing as far as color coding and like items...I have grown fond of the Joy Mangano hangers as the clothes stay on the hangers and they are very thin so as to not take up room. I have tried the knockoffs but prefer the JM hangers for uniformity.
Great ideas and love your flip flop and sandals box!

Sarah said...

I'm at work on our small walkin closet yet again. It's a yearly task.