Your Custom Walk-in Closet 7-Day Organization Challenge

Todd Saieva • Jan 17, 2023

Devoting an entire day to something like a custom walk-in closet may be unrealistic for you; your closet might be too cluttered and messy to resolve the problem in a single day, or you just might not have a whole day to devote to it. When you can break it down into a single task a day for seven days, it becomes a lot more manageable.

Day 1: Empty Your Closet
Day 2: Clean the Closet Space
Day 3: Take Inventory and Purge
Day 4: Divide into Zones
Day 5: Add Accessories and Organizers
Day 6: Store Out-of-Season Clothes
Day 7: Restock Your Closet

Take a look at a 7-day organizational challenge routine that can help you create and organize the custom walk-in closet you’ve been dreaming of.

Day 1: Empty Your Closet

It’s always going to be easier to clean and organize your closet if you can work with empty space. Trying to clean around the clothes that are already in the closet can be fairly difficult. Start by just getting everything out of your closet. This is enough of a task for day 1, as it can be fairly time-consuming by itself.

Since you’re not planning to put everything back immediately, you may want to move the emptied clothes and accessories out of the bedroom entirely. An empty room, like an unused guest room, can be the perfect space to put your clothes in the meantime. Right now, you just want to get them out of your way. If you can separate them by type of item – for example, shirts in one pile, pants in another – that’s a good start

Day 2: Clean the Closet Space

As long as you have the closet emptied, this is a good time to clean it. Why would you want to put things back on dusty shelves or walk on dirty floors? Clean the walls, insides of drawers, surfaces, and floors.

As you move on to other parts of the closet reorganization process, you’ll have a closet that’s not only empty but also sparkling clean to work with. You’ll know that as you put things back in there, they’ll be kept clean and safe.

Day 3: Take Inventory, Separate, and Purge

Now, you will need to visit the clothes that you removed from the closet on the first day. This is the time to take inventory of what you have. You may want to make notes on what you will need to put back in the closet. Knowing that you have 12 pairs of shoes or 14 pairs of jeans, for example, will help you estimate how much space you will need for shoes or jeans.

At the same time, purge the clothes you no longer need or want. If you haven’t worn it for a long time, you probably don’t need it anymore. When you come across a sweater full of holes that you can’t fix or that’s gotten too small for you, don’t add it to your inventory. Add it to the garbage pile or a pile of clothes you’re donating. As you separate the clothes into “keep” and “don't keep” piles, make sure that you’re also making a pile for out-of-season clothes that you’re keeping, but that aren’t part of your wardrobe that you’re wearing right now.

While this amounts to several tasks, you can do them all at once. Another way to look at it is that Day 3 is about going through your clothes.

Day 4: Divide into Zones

Today, you’re getting back to your closet. Now that you have an inventory and know what needs to be in the closet going forward, you can divide the closet into zones. You may have shirts in one zone, pants in another, and dresses in a third, for example.

Draw a blueprint or simple map if you like, so you have a guide for how to put your remaining items back into your closet.

Day 5: Add Accessories and Organizers

Consider whether your current closet design is adequate for everything you need to put away. If you’ve acquired a lot of hats since the last time you organized the closet, for example, you may want to include hooks or storage boxes to keep the hats in. If your accessories have a way of getting strewn all over the closet, you may want to add an over-the-door organizer to help keep small items in check

Day 6: Store Out-of-Season Clothes

Remember that pile of out-of-season clothes? It’s time to put those away. Make sure you’re using smart strategies for storing out-of-season clothing. HuffPost suggests that you look into natural linen or cotton storage containers over plastic, which might encourage discoloration or mildew.

It's best to put away out-of-season clothes before the clothes you're currently wearing. The reason is that these items can go in the back or on the bottom to keep the things you’re using now more accessible.

Day 7: Restock Your Closet

Now is the time to restock your closet with the items that you’re keeping and that are currently in season. Consult your blueprint or map and make sure you’re moving each item into the correct zone. That will help you find your clothes more easily and keep the space from becoming messy again anytime soon.

Conclusion

Over the course of just one week, your closet can go from cluttered chaos to a calm, clean, and attractive place to store your clothing and accessories.