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When we returned home from Mexico, we had to book yet another hotel room for the night. I mean, seriously, we didn’t have any furniture at the house yet and the painters were still painting. We needed a place to sleep and we knew we would be redesigning the master closet. Thus, we headed to the house to see the progress.

Where in The World Do We Begin?

The hardest part was trying to figure out where to start. Since we were going to be redesigning the master closet and kitchen pantry, replacing all of the appliances, installing carpet in the family room, and painting all of the trim inside the house, it was a lot to consider. And, it was extremely overwhelming; so much so that I wanted to run right back to Mexico!

We Need a Place to Sleep

Logically, having a place to sleep was a top priority, so we decided to start in our bedroom. Since we had torn out the existing closet shelving as well as the carpet, getting the closet put together was a top priority. So how do we go about redesigning the master closet to make it fit our needs?

Each house has its own personality, our previous home was so white, light and bright. However, this house has more dark tones, and we also have a small forest behind us. Dark tones are fine, as long as you counter them with light tones. Our closet had been re-textured and painted white while we were in Mexico, so we were starting with a blank canvas.

Choose the Right Lighting

The first thing we knew we had to change was the light fixture. Having good lighting is more important than people realize. First, you need to see your clothes; second, better lighting opens up a space making it appear so much larger; and third, you need to see your clothes. How on earth can you tell the difference between navy and black in a dark space?

We prefer “daylight” led lighting as it is a nice clean white light. And LED lighting uses less energy and puts off less heat than traditional lighting. Soft white lighting is yellowy and we just don’t like it. Initially, there was a small fluorescent light fixture – really not a pretty sight to look at. So, we added a nice looking LED light fixture. There are no lightbulbs, it is supposed to last ten years, was easy to install and it had three settings to choose from. Of course, we chose “daylight”.

Select the Right Flooring

Having carpet in a closet is nice, but difficult to keep clean. Todd is allergic to so many things, that we have found hardwood flooring works better for him. Keeping it clean is also so much easier. Thus, we headed to Home Depot to find a flooring solution for the closet.

I feel that I really need to show our previous closet that we redesigned in our old house. Todd laid all of the travertine tiles, and we installed the Closet Maid System. Here are the before and after pictures.

Wow, what a difference redesigning the master closet can make!

Each House Has its Own Character

As I said before, this house has a more rustic feel to it. And, our bedroom has a dark wood floor. At first, I kept thinking we needed to exactly match the bedroom floor. Which, you can imagine, is a difficult task. However, you have to walk through the bathroom, which has tile flooring, to get to the master closet. This means there is a separation between the flooring in the bedroom and the closet.

Think Outside the “Box”

This is when I had an “aha” moment. It didn’t have to be the same flooring! We tend to repeat things automatically.  “This is what we always do.”  How about thinking outside the box and starting from scratch.  “What should we put in here?”  This is the question we need to start with. 

What a concept, the relief I felt was amazing. We had the freedom to find something specifically for the master closet. Something new and different.  We were creating a new space, concept or design, instead of recreating the design to be the same as what we had before. Boom!

Ultimately, we decided on a beautiful coffee-stained engineered wood flooring. And, as a bonus, it was on sale! Since it was a pretty small space, we only needed a few boxes. Todd worked diligently to install the flooring and he did a wonderful job!

Initially, he wanted to glue it down, but the Home Depot Associate told him to “float” the floor. Floating means that you lay down a “cushion or underlayment” and simply connect the flooring on top of it.

Not the best advice for us, because floating a floor makes it sound like you are walking on a hollow box with tap shoes. So, my advice is, glue it down if you can! It creates a more permanent-feeling, solid flooring. Whew, redesigning the master closet is tough work!

Now to Select the Closet System

Next, we had to determine what closet system we were going to use for our master closet. Our closet is long and narrow. It measured 127″ X 66″; Basically 10 feet by 5 feet. And, we had to allow for the door to open in as well as the alarm system mounted on the wall. That meant Todd’s side was only 7 feet long. We all know that men and women need different spaces in the closet. Men need double hanging rods, and women need those as well as a single rod for long dresses, etc. So we had to keep this in mind.

Additionally, we had no linen closet in our room, this meant it had to be included in the master closet. Having a place to store sheets and towels was mandatory. Although we will eventually, we will be redesigning the master bathroom, that is not in our immediate future. However, when we do, we will add a linen closet. But, for now, the master closet is the place for all of it.

With that in mind, we decided that the linen storage had to be on the long wall along with my clothes, and the shorter wall would be all for Todd’s clothes.

Back to Home Depot

For shelving, we headed back to Home Depot to pick up the Closet Maid Shelf System, that we had installed in our previous house. Since it worked so well for us before, we knew it would be a great system for this house.

Ultimately, we picked the red cherry Closet Maid shelves instead of the white. We felt that it would be a nice change and would fit better with the house.

In addition, we bought heavy-duty metal rods and holders instead of using the ones that came with the system. Mainly because we wanted to make sure they could hold the weight of all our clothes and we just liked the look better. Also, the rods can be cut to size, which gave us a little more freedom for designing the layout.

As for the shelf units, we bought two units for each side. On my side, we had a unit for the linens, a section with double rods, the second unit, and a single rod for dresses.

For Todd’s side, we simply put one unit against the wall and one at the point where the door could still open all the way. Then, we installed the double rods.

Where to Store Shoes?

And, then the ultimate dilemma, where do we put our shoes? Luckily, I don’t have a lot of shoes, so it wasn’t too difficult to find a solution for storing them. Searching on Pinterest and the internet, there were so many different shoe storage ideas. But, I didn’t find one that would work for our space.

Fortunately, I kept a lot of shelving from our previous house in case we needed to use it in this house. You never really know what you will or will not need when you change houses. I’m so glad I did because this Ikea shelf worked out perfectly!

How to Top-Off the Master Closet

Closet Maid has an optional shelf you can add to finish off the shelf system. But, since our layout exceeded the width of the shelving, we needed to make our own shelf to fit. (As a side note, having a shelf above the clothes provides a great place to store my Christmas Decorations. See my Christmas Decorating Ideas post for ideas for next year!)

Thus, we bought nicely finished 12-inch wide wood in 12-foot sections, and cut it to fit our space. But, since we needed a 15″ shelf, we also bought 3″ wide wood to close the gap in the back. We stained the shelving to match the red cherry color of the shelving system. The end result worked out perfectly for us!

Read about our downsizing experience in “Downsizing Our Latest Adventure” and “Downsizing – Part 2”.

I can’t wait to show you more of the wonderful changes we made in the house – part 4 coming soon!

Enjoy,