About a year and a half ago, I had spent a lot of time reading blogs about home organization, DIY updating and repurposing, and improving the functionality of your home. As one of my first projects, I decided to tackle the mess that was our linens closet. I don’t have any pictures from that initial reorganization, but I have noticed the past few weeks that it’s getting bad again, so I just decided to redo the initial organization and chronicle the process for you!

This is what it looked like right before I started. You can see the remnants of what I consider to be a pretty good system, but there are some people (ahem, Hubby) who just haven’t kept with the system quite as well as we did in the beginning. What did I start with? Cleaning the whole thing out.

The first idea that I took from several blog posts about small closets or linen closets was using laundry baskets on the shelves. This worked perfectly for my closet because the shelves are really deep, and I wanted to make the most of that space while still being able to find everything in the back. Since then, I’ve used laundry baskets in organizing several other spaces… more on that later, maybe. You can tell in the first photo at the top that I had a laundry basket and a smaller basket or two leftover from my first stab at organization.

Next, I had to determine which way I would like things folded so that they fit in the baskets nicely. Pillowcases were the main issue – there are so many, there are two different sizes, and they take up so much room! I decided to roll them (cue applause from my father) after I had folded them, and stick them standing up in their basket. 

The way I folded and then rolled caused the king-sized pillowcases to stick out above the queen-sized ones. Score!

Everyone loves a label, even if it isn’t a fancy little printable. That sharpie job there works just as well.

I continued to separate sheets and towels by sizes, and put them into corresponding baskets. Then I had an enclosed bin at the very bottom for our beach towels… we use those a lot less so I don’t mind them being a little harder to reach.

I still think the vacuum and mop look a bit silly in there, but I just didn’t really have much to do with them otherwise. That’s a fix for later!

By the way – the main thing that I purged from the closet were curtains. I always like putting curtains on our windows (we have no blinds) because it adds a finished look to a room, even if it’s not all the way there yet. So every time we’ve redesigned a room (study to nursery, girl room to boy room, etc) we’ve gotten new curtains (usually at Target). So naturally, I have a pile of curtains that aren’t currently in use that were taking up a lot of space. I moved them to the basement out of the way for now, but kept them… because who knows when we might need a change?!

Have you ever had to reorganize a closet? What do you think about using laundry baskets as organizational tools?