Ready to find some amazing space saving storage ideas for a small wardrobe in your house? Here are some fantastic tips and solutions that you can use right now to create more space in your tiny closet, and maximise the space you have. You may be surprised at how much more you can fit inside when you’ve tried some of these amazing tricks.
Unfortunately, we’re not all blessed with the huge walk in wardrobes we see on TV.
Ones that have space to literally swing a cat – and some of which are honestly bigger than my master bedroom lol.
In an ideal world it would be lovely to have something like this (although I’m starting to think it wouldn’t because we tend to fill what we have!), but we have to make do with the space we have.
Especially in the UK, storage is very thin on the ground in bedrooms.
Not many homes have any sort of built in cupboard space, and even when they do they tend to be teeny tiny.
So, we often have to make do with either this small cupboard space, or get a standalone wardrobe.
Either way – having only about a metre of hanging space in total is quite common – so what’s a girl (or boy!) to do?
Here are my ideas for making the most of that space, however small, so you can store your clothes well, be able to see them, and fit as much in as possible to avoid the dreaded floordrobe (wardrobe on the floor… don’t say you don’t have one….)
3 Things To Do Before you Organise Anything
I always like to have a plan, and not just go straight into trying to organise what’s there.
Chances are you will have things in your wardrobe that don’t need to be there at all – so it makes sense to sort things out first, and then you will know exactly what needs storage space.
Declutter
Yes, Yes, I’m a broken record sometimes, aren’t I!
But decluttering really is crucial, especially when you have very little space to play with.
You don’t want to be wasting your time by trying to organise that which you actually don’t need….
Take a few minutes to go through your wardrobe and whittle out anything that really doesn’t belong there (clothes that don’t fit, clothes you don’t wear, clothes that are faulty, clothes that just aren’t your style anymore etc…)
Don’t Hang As Much
You may have just created a habit of hanging everything – whereas there may be a chance that you can fold more than you think.
If you start to look at how you’re storing each type of clothing, you can usually free up some space in your wardrobe this way.
For example – Jumpers and woollens can stretch or become dented by hangers, and T-shirts can easily be folded into a drawer instead.
Store Your Less Used Clothes Elsewhere
Do you have coats, evening dresses, jackets etc… in your wardrobe at the moment?
These items not only are bulky – but they are also only used for part of the year.
As such – can you store them elsewhere?
You may have a guest bedroom that could have a wardrobe for these types of clothes, or use a hanging rail in the loft if it’s dry and OK to do so.
Think outside the box a little.
Brilliant Storage Ideas For A Small Wardrobe
You now should have exactly what you really need in your wardrobe, and it should hopefully be feeling a little lighter and more manageable already.
What I want to look at next is how to maximise the space in your wardrobe, and give you some fantastic storage ideas along the way.
I hope it’s useful…
#1 – Double Hanging
This is a really easy and quick way to create double the storage in the same amount of space, and is something my hubby and I used with great results in one of our previous homes.
You see, we had a TINY bedroom. There was space for one single wardrobe, and that was it. This picture shows you what space we had (and I’m standing outside the bedroom to take that photo – so the room was just big enough for the length of the bed, and the wardrobe space was just a metre wide if that…): –
There also wasn’t any extra space in other bedrooms for any extra storage – so we had to make that space stretch as much as possible.
Adding in 2 rails to the single wardrobe meant we both had space for most of our stuff, and it used the full vertical height of the wardrobe really well (Yes, I had to fold some of my longer dresses in half over a hanger but this was fine as they were cotton dresses and so weren’t affected too much).
(You can also just see that I added a few baskets to the small area between the top of the wardrobe and the ceiling – this was to store winter hats, gloves and scarves, and summer hats and sunglasses etc… – and was a great use of otherwise wasted space).
As well as double hanging, another idea is triple hanging! – If you can do double – then why not look at triple? Perfect for smaller length items, or kids items.
#2 – Move the hanging rail up or down to create more useable storage space
If you really can’t add in another rail (this may not be possible if the height of the wardrobe doesn’t allow for 2 good size hanging heights), then you could look at moving the rail that you DO have.
Moving it down means you could add in storage above it (see tip #3), and moving it up means you can use the floor space more wisely (see tips #3 and 4).
#3 – Add Extra shelves Above Or Below the Hanging Rail
Adding in an extra shelf or two can also help with storage for your clothes, in an easy way.
There are two options, you could add a shelf using a drill (either yourself if you’re good at DIY, or with the help of a good handyman) OR you can use shelving that works on tension and so doesn’t need any drilling at all – something like this would be great.
#4 – Use The Floor Space
Never waste space – especially the floor space in a wardrobe.
Whether you can use all the space (because your hanging items are all short enough), or you can use half the space (because some of your hanging items are full length), just make the most of the space you have.
I love to use baskets, boxes, small shelves etc.. depending on what I am storing.
For instance – at present I store my jeans all folder up in the bottom of my wardrobe, and my gym bag.
If you need to store shoes – then stackable shoe boxes are perfect – especially clear ones so you can see what’s what!
#5 – Make The Most Of The Space Below Shelves
Adding in shelves, or working with the shelves you have, may lead to other storage opportunities.
I have used under shelf baskets in my larder cupboard in the kitchen already, but there’s no reason why you couldn’t add under shelf baskets to your wardrobe as well – and have things like accessories in them for easy access.
#6 – Create Compartments For Shelves
If you have a shelf currently, but there is a lot of height in the shelf space, then you can be tempted to pile things up high to make the most of the space.
This in theory is a good idea, but in reality it usually means that you end up with things falling into each other, or falling on top of you when you try and pull something out.
As such, I’d recommend adding in compartments/shelf dividers to the shelving which will help to keep things neater, help to make the most of the height of the space, but stops things falling onto each other as much…
#7 – Add Hooks On The Inside Of The Doors
Not one to miss out on a storage opportunity, don’t forget the doors to your wardrobe.
I use hooks on the inside of the doors to provide storage for all sorts of things: –
- Scarves
- Belts
- Chunky / Long necklaces
TIP – make sure the hook has small door size, as most are made for proper doors into rooms. Something like this would work well and would be perfect for storing necklaces, scarves, belts etc.. on.
You could also simply use stick on hooks such as command hooks as you can add these exactly where you need them.
TIP – Always make sure the wardrobe door can close, and that anything on the hooks isn’t damaging the clothes hanging up…
And you could also use this space for all sorts of small item storage such as underwear, accessories etc…. by using an over door storage rack with lots of compartments.
#8 – Use Clever Coathangers
Last but most definitely not least, is my favourite and probably the quickest way to make space in a wardrobe – and that’s by using the right coathangers.
I LOVE LOVE LOVE using these slim coat hangers, and wrote a post all about them if you want to read in more detail. They really will give you more hanging space and it feels like magic when you change them over!
Another great idea if you have more vertical space but don’t want to add in extra shelving, because you need more hanging space ideally, is to make use of cascading hangers.
You can get a LOT more items hanging up – and they are really easy to use too.
… One Extra Thing To Consider
If your budget allows, and you really want to maximise the space you have in the room rather than maximise what space there is in your current wardrobe, you may want to think about getting fitted wardrobes built in.
Built in wardrobes would make the most of all the height and width of the space available, and you could add in the shelves and double hanging etc… that we have talked about above to make sure you are getting the most out of every square inch.
It’s worth considering, so I wanted to add it in as an option.
So, there you have it – loads of storage ideas for a small wardrobe that will make the most of the space you have.
Basically, try and think about every part of the wardrobe that you can maximise : –
Add in shelving / Create double hanging / Use the floor / Use the door / Use space saving coat hangers
and you’ll find that you have more space than you ever thought possible. I hope it’s inspired you to try a few ideas out!
…and if you’d like to get even more advice on organising your clothes, you’ll love reading these posts next: –
