My closet is in the upper floor of our bungalow. A previous owner built it into the sloped wall, probably around the time they finished the upstairs.

When they built out the closet, they made some design choices that I probably would not have made. As you can see, it is a wide closet with three distinct areas: there are two 22" wide closets with swing-out doors on either side. In the middle is a much larger area with sliding doors. That area is divided in half by a post, which I'm not sure whether it is load-bearing.

It is actually plenty of space for me (almost all my clothes will fit in one of the 22" wide sections), but the issue is organization. I cannot for the life of me figure out how to organize the closet to include hanging items, folded items, bags, shoes, etc. The knee wall is only about 49" tall, too short for most prefab wall-mounted systems. Besides that, the closet is quite deep at 37", so I would have to reach pretty far in if I did mount a system to the knee wall. Finally, the base for the doors sits 17" off the ground, which really limits what I can do in terms of drawers or shelving towards the floor.

Short of trying to use hanging organizers--which is an imperfect solution, though I'm OK with it for now--what could I do to make this work? Would it make sense to knock out the 17" base, build out the knee wall to actually make the closet shallower, and put in a system? Or should I just knock out the base and try to put in a freestanding system like Elfa? (I would still have to cut it down to size as the closet isn't that tall.) WWYD on a smallish (say, $1000-2000) budget?

That really is a challenge.

I would go low tech for now and use one of these until you see how you use the closet. It may be that you change your mind about keeping folded items in there, once you start doing it.



Then you'd have a better sense of what you need.

I would be tempted to knock out that 17" baseboard on all the closets. That just looks difficult.

Do you have to share the closet with anyone?

Honestly, if you don't need all three clothing sections and are determined to keep your wardrobe small...
I would lower the shelf on one of the 22" - having your hanging clothes on the bar and jeans/sweaters on the top shelf.
In the other 22", I would get a free standing system or install shelves at the appropriate heights for your shoes, bags, scarves, hats, ect.
In the wide center section: I would take of the doors, make sure the flooring of the room extends in that area - paint the walls - and then either have a desk for a mini-office, or if you really like the closet space, have a vanity table, a valet or mannequin so you can set out the next day's outfits, and an etagere for your pretties (favorite handbags, perfume bottles, ect)

These are phenomenal ideas! I <3 TPF.

I should probably investigate how involved it would be to knock out the baseboard thing. It would certainly make everything much easier (even though I'd have to get new doors). Love the idea of opening up the center section! But I do need to consider resale value in all this.

In the meantime, Doreen, the hanging shelving you posted makes a lot of sense for sweaters and whatnot. I'm using a shoe one currently for a few knits, but it is obviously not designed for that.

I don't share the closets, they are all mine, bwaahahaha! (My fiance's closet is downstairs.) But I would like to leave some space empty for when we have houseguests.

I agree with the idea of knocking out that 17" baseboard....it looks really awkward and more like it is a storage area as opposed to an actual closet.

If this is only a spare bedroom, then I wouldn't worry too much about converting the middle space into a desk area...that may actually be desirable.

Are you sure there isn't anything in that base wall, like electrical wiring? It's so odd that I cant believe it's there for no reason.

Love your Iggy avatar Doreen! It's tempting me to change mine to this to keep the Star Trek theme going.

I don't think there is any wiring in the baseboard wall, but I should check... that is a really good point.

It isn't really a spare bedroom. Technically the house has three bedrooms, one downstairs and two upstairs. This is the only closet upstairs. In reality the upstairs is divided into one distinct bedroom, with a door that closes and everything, and which we use as our bedroom (but we give it up on the rare occasion we have houseguests... for complicated reasons including our house's layout and our cat). The rest of the space is pretty much open although technically it counts as a bedroom since there's a door that closes off the space from the stairs. I use the second "bedroom" -- the open space -- as my workspace, dressing area, etc. This long closet sits opposite the upstairs bathroom and in between the two bedrooms.

It's a really weird layout, I think partly because it's a half floor and there's only so much you can do to work around the slanted ceilings, and partly because whoever finished the upstairs didn't really think it all through.

I would think about gutting it and remodeling it. Or not using it for clothes - maybe for hampers and shelf storage instead.

Well I spent the better part of the morning reorganizing. Scrounged up a hanging sweater organizer and moved the hanging shoe organizer over from the narrower closet. I think this will hold me for a while at least. I still really want to rip out the baseboard and completely redo the interior of the closet. But for now...

I also went through and reorganized my "functional" clothing i.e. running clothes, hiking clothes, etc. That all lives in the left-hand narrow closet now. (Kind of crazy, I think I have more "functional" clothes than clothes clothes!) So I am using half of the closet space I have -- one narrow closet and half of the big wide middle area.

Looks good!

I like your idea of rotating your avatars. I picked this one because he looks so haute with the bag.

I would paint the inside of your closet a medium color-not too dark but not pastel. I would buy a new rod in metal-the wood one you have looks like it is slightly bending. I would buy new thin non slip fabric covered hangers from a store like TJMaxx or Marshallls. They will give you more space and have a organized look. You can also get pretty baskets/bins for things out of season. I personally don't like those hanging fabric things you use in a closet for storage. A wood tower box shelf would give you a more solid piece for storage.
http://www.ikea.com has great closet stuff.
For any even wall closet part I would take the door off and put up a curtain instead of a door. My friend has a bungalow house and her upstairs closet gets a slight smell in it-probably because of it being in a attic room and the ventilation. Once she removed the doors she never had a problem again. I think the whole closet would look better without doors because a open concept is so easy to use.