What's the secret to making my closets work for me?

What's the secret to making my closets work for me?

Mary Astadourian (Professional Organizer) gives expert video advice on: Why is it so hard to get organized?; How do I know if I am disorganized?; What are the different styles of organization? and more...

A lot of times, people just think of closets as closets. They don't really think of them as a space, or as a separate individual space that exists in your home. I like to think of closets, really, as little rooms. Something that I always tell people that they might want to do, is when you're emptying out your closet because you're about to re-organize it, take a look at the closet itself. Maybe it needs a fresh coat of paint. Nothing makes something look more clean, fresh and new than a coat of paint. So maybe you want to do that. Maybe you need to actually put a light in your closet or put a better light in your closet so that you can see the things in it better. It is always nice to give your closet a little bit of a touch up and just make it look better. Then, when you are putting things back in, you've created a new environment, actually, for your items to go in. A lot of times too, there are a lot of closets in your home that are forgotten. There is always that coat closet that really is more like the junk closet. It has got coats in it but it has also got a whole lot of other things. Take a look at these closets and see how can you better utilize that space. Hang the coats but maybe on the floor of the closet, instead of stacking old gift boxes or whatever else you might have down there, and put some containers in there to hold things that you just don't have any other space for but just to make it a look a little tidier and cleaner. There are just all kinds of little things like that, that you can do that can turn a closet that just looks like a mess into something a lot more manageable and cleaner.