Certainly the biggest guilty secret in our apartment has been the state of our walk-in closet, where things went in, but seemed to rarely depart. But thanks to a few yard sales, following some of our own tips, and viscious cleanings/donations, we've wrangled the beast to the point we were able to optimize the storage area so we could even convert part of the closet into an additional library this week...
Mission Accomplished: The Closet Library
Besides the thrill of being able to actually walk all the way back into the closet now and get to clothing without the requirement of some yoga-style positioning, our most welcome addition is the space we've made for our books. We've been hiding them anywhere and everywhere, doubling them up behind one another on our bookshelves and hidden under furniture throughout. But now we've added a small bookshelf into the closet and placed my collection of graphic novels/comic books ontop, above our DVD collection. Yeah, I know some of you would just say get rid of the books, but that's not happening with a book-loving designer and a librarian, so we'll just do without less other stuff so we can keep our precious printed matter.
The next step will be an extremely involved one. Just as we ripped our whole collection of CDs to digital files (in duplicate, of course), we'd like to convert all our DVDs and store them onto a terabyte drive and just stream them directly to the Apple TV. We'd also like to replace the cheap-o IKEA storage boxes we bought a few years ago; they're falling apart thanks to our snooping cats and their flimsy construction. Lastily, I've got a few boxes of old financial documents that require some serious Watergate shredding, and this should open up additional space in the rear of the closet. Who knows, by the end of the process, we might be able to sublet the closet and host our next ATLA party inside it.
Tags
organizing, shelving & storage, Look!, books, organization, library, closetRelated Links
- Adding a Bit of Personal Touch To The Closet
- Monsieur Dress Up: A Properly Tailored Wall Hanger
- Creating Order: ROYGBIV
- Tips To Shed Your Magazine Collection
And How To Organize the Rest - How To: Create a Table of Contents for Your Files
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Comments (17)
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get rid of the dvds
view SydneyBristow's profile
Nice job!
view wig3000's profile
keep the dvd's....but tell me where you got those hanging tshirt shelves. please spill the beans!
view mfpants's profile
I just did a similar clean out, and my solution was to put the DVDs in portable CD holders -- the soft binders that have plastic sleeves for 50 CDs. I realized I didn't need all those DVD boxes at all. I just bought a CD holder for each genre of movie -- comedy, classic drama, etc. Three shelves of DVDs miraculously fit into four binders (which took up no more space than three hardback books.
view Lisa Hunter (Montreal)'s profile
Love it. I love it even more that you find keeping books some important. Also, I think we own most of the same comics as you. Only with more DC. =-)
view Christal's profile
for the win!
verrrry nice.
view kdkaboom's profile
Is that an In-N-Out t-shirt? Now I'm hungry. Living on the east coast sucks.
view Shawn's profile
Bravo! Excellent work and planning of such a wee space!
view darcidoodle's profile
I have Cranium in my closet too! Best. Game. Ever.
view itsamandal's profile
Agree with the DVD ripping. External hard drives are cheap, and HandBrake is awesome.
view ChzPlz's profile
You should check out the Pedia programs if you're in need of some organisational help with your media. Once you get around to ripping your DVDs to a hard drive, you can even play them straight through Front Row with DVDpedia.
view norabruji's profile
mfpants: If I remember correctly, we got the hanging shelving at The Container Store.
Shawn: haha, no, I think you're mistaking my Sprout surf t-shirt for an In-N-Out tee. Not that I wouldn't want one of those too, alongside a double double.
itsamandal: I think every closet should have Cranium, waiting and ready. Another fun one is Apples to Apples.
norabruji: thanks for the tip. Once I handbrake the bulk of these DVDs, I can start organizing the files (I've used CDpedia and Bookpedia in the past) for streaming goodness.
view gregory's profile
The hanging shelves are definitely from The Container Store:
http://www.containerstore.com/browse/Product.jhtml?CATID=152&PRODID=10022387
view ashby's profile
IMO, If it's a good enough movie to keep or permanently archive on a hard-drive, I would think you'd want it on Blu-Ray's higher-def 1080p format.
Thanks to backward compatibility of BluRay players, dvd's won't exactly go the way of VHS tapes, but they almost certainly will be far less popular, once all those titles get reissued in BluRay and it becomes the "standard" format.
At first I didn't think BluRay could be that much better than dvd, but the difference in resolution and color vibrancy is startling. I see the difference as being roughly the same as the difference between VHS and dvd.
view lightspeed's profile
For me, if it's a good enough movie to keep or permanently archive on a hard-drive, I want it on Blu-Ray's higher-def 1080p format.
Thanks to backward compatibility of BluRay players, dvd's won't exactly go the way of VHS tapes (or at least the transition won't be as precipitous), but they almost certainly will be far less popular, once all those titles get reissued in BluRay and it becomes the "standard" format.
At first I didn't think BluRay could be that much better than dvd, but the difference in resolution and color vibrancy is startling. I see the difference as being roughly the same as the difference between VHS and dvd.
view lightspeed's profile
Libraries have books in them.
view MichaelF's profile
where do the shoes go?
view witchbaby's profile