Your bedroom is your oasis, the serene space away from all of the stress of the world. It is where we go to rest and relax, but all too often it also becomes a catchall for so many of our belongings, creating a cluttered room that is overwhelming instead of peaceful.
A tidy, well-organized bedroom is the solution to this problem. I have several great tips to help you turn your bedroom into a calming sanctuary.
To organize your bedroom, consider the following ideas:
- Purge your belongings
- Maximize drawer space in bedside tables and dressers.
- Add floating bookshelves to display decorative items.
- Organize your closet by clothing type and color.
- Use clear storage containers and totes.
- Jewelry organizers are a must.
- Be creative with shoe storage.
- Store rarely used items under the bed.
- Consider furniture items with hidden storage space.
- Hide your dirty laundry
Cleaning and organizing your bedroom can seem like a daunting task, but if you complete the actions above, your room can be transformed! Keep reading for more details about these key action items to help you as you go through this process.
Purge Your Belongings
The very first thing the must be completed before you do anything else is to do an honest review of the items that are cluttering up your room. Move through each part of your room and sort things into four separate piles: Keep, Donate, Other Room, Trash.
Use boxes or bins for anything that will not be remaining in the room. Anything that you are keeping can either stay in its current location for the time being or piled onto the bed.
Identify Items That Belong in Another Room
Sometimes when we are in a hurry, we end up using our bedroom as a place to drop the miscellaneous items that collect throughout the house, just to get them out of sight. Use a bin or laundry basket to collect these things. This will make it easy to carry everything to its new and proper place throughout the house.
Donate or Trash
Anything else that is not going to be kept, needs to either be donated or trashed. Throw away anything that is worn or tattered. Donate anything that might still be usable or saleable. Be honest with yourself about clothes that no longer fit, or objects that you have been hanging onto for too long. A good rule of thumb is that if you have not used it in a year, it can probably go unless it holds strong sentimental value.
Maximize Drawer Space
Make the most of the drawer space provided by your bedside tables, dressers, and vanity. You want to use this furniture to store the items that make the most sense to have in these locations. Keep the tops free of unnecessary clutter, instead use the space to displace a few well-placed photos, lamps, or carefully chosen decorative items.
Bedside Tables
Use the drawers in your bedside table to store personal health and beauty products, books or magazines that you are reading, phone chargers, and smaller things of this nature.
You can use bamboo drawer organizers like these to keep your things sorted and tidy.
If your stand has more than one drawer, the lower drawers are a good place to store sentimental items that you don't necessarily want to put into storage, but also don't want to have sitting out. Files with important and sensitive paperwork, like tax and financial information, medical records, insurance policies and such are all good candidates for this space.
Basic expanding files keep your files sorted and organized, which will make it easier to find what you need instead of having to rifle through a drawer of loose paperwork.
These drawers are also a good place to keep photo albums, children's artwork, and other keepsakes.
Dresser Space
The dresser is where most people store their undergarments, socks, and clothing items that don't need to be hung up, like t-shirts and sweaters.
Use drawer dividers to help organize undergarments. A lot of these items are small and if they are not sorted into dividers, the drawers can become just a hodgepodge of garments.
Try some foldable organizers like these from Magicfly, which have been specially designed for this purpose.
When folding shirts or sweaters, instead of stacking them in the drawers vertically, fold them to place in the drawers in horizontal stacks so you can see everything that is in that drawer, like this:
Vanities
Since the purpose of a vanity is to have a place to groom oneself and apply makeup, it makes sense that this is where you will want to store your skin and hair care products and makeup. A beautifully organized vanity will make it much easier to find what you are looking for as well as keep your products and tools clean and hygienic.
Electrical appliances like your hair dryer, curling iron, and flat iron should be stored in one drawer, with clips, pins, barrettes, and hair ties in another.
Skin care products, creams, lotions, and perfumes should be stored separately from your makeup, in order to prevent ruining all of your makeup if there is a spill. Drawer organizers are great for dividing small makeup items, like brushes and lip colors.
Add Floating Bookshelves
Floating bookshelves are a great way to give yourself a little more space for storing books, knick-knacks, pictures and such. Just be careful not to over-clutter the space.
There is a lot of variety in the styles available, from rustic wood to simple white shelving like the ones below.
Organize Your Closet
The closet is the biggest, most complex part of the bedroom as this is where we store most of what we own.
In phase one, you should have already purged your closet of garments that you can't or won't wear.
Now, your task is to sort your clothes by type. Hang pants with pants, shirts with shirts, etc. Then arrange them by color. This will make it much easier to create outfits. Be sure to use the correct type of hanger for the garments that you are hanging.
Garments that are going to be stacked on shelves should be folded and stacked horizontally. An even better idea is to stack these same items into baskets or bins. You will still be able to see the clothes, but the bins will keep the clothes corralled so they don't end up scattered or messy.
Hang scarves on clothes hangers to keep them visible and easy to reach. Hats should be stacked on shelves, or placed into storage containers to help them keep their shape.
Purses and bags can be placed into metal or plastic file organizers to keep them standing upright and easy to see also.
Use Clear Storage Containers
Clear containers are wonderful for storing clothes, bags, and shoes. They can be stacked neatly in the closet, while still providing visibility and easy accessibility. You can get these kinds of containers in several different sizes, so you can choose the ones that will work best for your needs.
Jewelry Organizers Are a Must
Improperly stored and organized jewelry can easily become a tangled mess if it is not sorted neatly. It is so easy to end up with a knot of necklaces, mismatched earrings, and broken bracelets.
Jewelry organizers are vital for maintaining and keeping your precious items in pristine condition. There are a lot of options available, including organizers that hold a combination of all types of jewelry, to those that are specifically designed for necklaces, bracelets, rings, and earrings.
This wall mounted version by Viefin is a great example of a combination storage unit.
Necklaces
Necklaces should be hung from hooks. Hanging necklaces helps prevent them from getting tangled into unmanageable knots. This can be something as simple as a pegboard with pins that are strong enough to hold the necklaces, to beautiful racks that double as decorative shelving, like this:
Another option, especially for expensive pieces that you don't want to have hanging out in the open, is a necklace case. This beautiful, velvet lined case by Wuligirl is lockable and stackable, so you can store multiple cases on your closet shelf.
Rings
A ring organizer box is just the thing to keep your rings from getting lost in the bottom of a massive jewelry box. The cushions hold each ring snug and in place.
Earrings
A hanging jewelry organizer is a really good choice for earrings. The small see-through plastic pockets keep earrings paired up.
Be Creative with Shoe Storage
Shoes that are not stored using a good system can end up in a pile in the floor of shelves of the closet, damaging your shoes and making it hard to find what you need. The most ideal way to store shoes is to have a separate shelving unit that is specially designed for shoes.
While swoon-worthy, this is not an option for the majority, as a closet like this can be costly to install and takes up a lot of space. However, with a little creativity, you can protect your shoes, while keeping them easy to find and access.
One great way is to use the clear plastic storage bins mentioned earlier in this post. You can stack them in the back of your closet or up on the shelves and they will stay neat and tidy.
Another option is a shoe cabinet. Place one of these inside your closet if there is room for it, or elsewhere in your bedroom. This dark wooden cabinet can double as a TV stand or a nightstand if space is really limited.
A more cost-effective idea is a simple plastic over the door shoe organizer.
Hang one of these from the back of your closet door or on your closet pole.
You can also hang tall boots using pants hangers. Just clip them to the tops of the boots then hang from your closet pole. This will help your tall boots keep their shape as well.
Use the Space Under the Bed
The space under the bed is an often overlooked place to keep belongings that you want to have easy access to, but are not necessarily used all of the time.
There are specially designed storage containers with wheels that you can use for coats, shoes, sweaters, extra blankets, or more.
Furniture With Hidden Storage
There are a lot of really cool and unique storage options when it comes to home furnishings.
Use a trunk or storage ottoman at the end of the bed to store extra linens, blankets, and pillows; or personal items like picture books, keepsakes, etc.
A captain's bed has built-in drawers for added storage. These are especially great for kid's rooms.
This platform storage bed from Prepac has plenty of space for all of your possessions.
Hide Your Dirty Laundry
A laundry hamper is an important component in a well-organized bedroom. Instead of using a common cloth hamper, choose one of the amazing options that will be a great addition to the decor, instead of detracting from it.
Choosing a great bamboo hamper can add style to your space instead of detracting from it. This dark brown wooden hamper is beautiful and functional.
Alternatively, you can get a hanging hamper that you can hang off a hook on the back of your closet or bathroom door. Use one of these to keep your dirty clothes out of sight until you have time to launder them.
Keep it Simple and Keep it Clean
As you can see, there are tons of things that you can do to get and keep your bedroom organized. If you follow the action items above, your room will be somewhere that you can really get away from the noise and chaos of the world outside. There really is nothing better than snuggling down in a comfy bed at the end of a long day and being able to relax!
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