Decluttering

We have a simple solution for separating the useful from the hopeful when it comes to your "just in case" clutter.

You could play Bohemian Rhapsody, do the damn chore, and still probably be done in time for headbanging.

The dump zone might look a little different depending on what room it’s in, but it will serve the same purpose.

It does a lot of work being a living/dining/sleeping/storage space all at once.

Unlike when you’re rifling through the kitchen looking for cookie cutters from Christmas ’09, you shouldn't approach your sentimental clutter searching for things to eliminate.

No matter how many cabinets you have, or whether your countertop is better measured in inches or acres, I guarantee that if you've been living in your space for a while, your kitchen storage is full.

Gather all your paper piles up from the dining table, entryway, desk, and kitchen counter, and sort it into these five categories.

Your entryway isn't likely the first spot you think needs decluttering. But whatever space welcomes you home probably works really hard to keep your life running smoothly.

Clutter isn't like a wine stain on the rug or a scuff on the wall, because clutter isn't ever truly gone from your life.

When you're sorting through your clothes, you should spend your time thinking about what you want to life with, instead of what you want to live without.

Set a timer for 20 minutes, and head into your living room with a laundry basket (or something else to collect clutter with).

Sure, maybe a whirlwind weekend spent in a twister of trash bags will get your space sorted faster than spending a month decluttering slowly. But the real winner here is the person who uncovered a new lifestyle that allows them to be perpetually uncluttered.

The space needed function and organization, but now this well-organized linen closet is too pretty to be hidden behind closed doors.

It's time to be ruthless. And your decluttering truth serum is these five questions.

Just 15 days is all it takes to be decluttered for good.

Here's how to chip away at whole-home organization while also still living your life.

“Tidying is the act of confronting yourself.” —Marie Kondo.

The worst time to discover you're out of cough medicine is when you wake up in the middle of the night hacking and barking.

From Monica Gellar-worthy organizational skills to Charlie Kelly-level messiness, glance at this grid to see where your distinct cleaning style falls.

We're now entering the third year of the September Sweep, helping our readers declutter tens of thousands of happy homes. And I hope your home is next.

These 10 guidelines can apply to any area you want to tackle, and will make every cleaning endeavor go just a little bit more smoothly.

To clear my head—and my space—for a season of carefree entertaining, here are five things I'm throwing away (or giving away) this summer.

Here is a step-by-step guide to decluttering your life and improving your sense of well-being—one section at a time.

You can do this weekend project from the comfort of a swinging hammock in less than a minute and it will make a small but measured difference in the way your phone makes you feel.

Here are some common culprits that make a clean bathroom appear disheveled.

I thought I was an all-star organizer, but my first week working with a luxury organizing company showed me that there is always room for improvement.

The "offload unused apps" setting will not only maximize your phone storage, it will also help you be more mindful of which apps you’re actually using day to day.

Reverse to-do lists begin at the end of the day. Here are three rules to keep in mind as you're writing one.

Embrace the in-between-ness of spring, put the winter behind you, and make room for the coming season.

I decided to majorly thin out my book collection—but to my surprise, it wasn't something that made me sad. Instead, I loved the library I was left with.

Good news for decor lovers and side hustlers alike: Poshmark has expanded beyond the closet and into the home.

Banish these things from your counters and not only will you have the room you need to do your thing, but you'll also end up reducing visual clutter.

It takes a lot of effort to appear effortless. Disney parks don't become the "most magical places on earth" without an enormous amount of behind-the-scenes problem-solving.

Use this time wisely and it will add up to a clean home, instead of just being caught up on Instagram.

With Spring Cleaning for Your Mood, we’re helping you get your housekeeping done no matter what state of mind you’re in. For 20 weekdays in April, we’ll focus on cleaning a new area of your space, with three different ways to get it done—so it’s easy to stay on track even when you’re busy, tired, or away from home. Sign up with your email now and enjoy a better space by the end of the month.

KonMari madness has taken hold of America. Purge your closet! Rid yourself of excess! Dump your bad boyfriends! Diagnosing clutter is easy when you’re being plonked on the head by expired cans of tuna every time you open an overstuffed closet—what’s more difficult to diagnose, however, is schedule clutter.

With Spring Cleaning for Your Mood, we’re helping you get your housekeeping done no matter what state of mind you’re in. For 20 weekdays in April, we’ll focus on cleaning a new area of your space, with three different ways to get it done—so it’s easy to stay on track even when you’re busy, tired, or away from home. Sign up with your email now and enjoy a better space by the end of the month.

It can be wildly difficult to cull your clothes collection, so try one of these three tracks to make it easier.

Apartment Therapy Weekend Projects is a guided program designed to help you get the happy, healthy home you’ve always wanted, one weekend at a time. Sign up now for email updates so you never miss a lesson. Is there such a thing as being caught up on housework? I never have been. Even if your weekly chores have been completed and the laundry monster mountain has been defeated, there’s probably something around the house that’s been bothering you to get it done.

A child’s relationship to books is one of the biggest predictors of their success down the road, and exposure to all types of print has a lot to do with early reading ability. So hang on to your well-worn “Calvin & Hobbes”treasuries, go ahead and subscribe to Highlights, and definitely send a book-loving message by keeping a fairly robust library, if that’s your thing.

Channel the energy behind the change in seasons to feel more in sync with your home.

There’s always that friend. You know, the one with 76 unheard voicemails, 150 unread texts, and—gulp—15,964 unread emails in her inbox. (Or maybe that “friend” is you.) Either way, keeping your inbox uncluttered or even reaching Inbox Zero can feel like impossible feats of #adulting. But digitally cleaning house doesn’t have to be your least favorite chore.

There are so many kinds of clutter: excess items you think you might need someday, clutter you’re so used to having around that you don’t even notice it anymore, piles of paper you have to go through, and things you feel guilty getting rid of because someone gave them to you or you spent good money on them. But there’s one kind of clutter you should never feel bad hanging on to.

If you thought your dried-out mascara wands weren’t good for anything but the trash can, think again. Thanks to Reddit user marilynbmonroe, the web is abuzz with a surprising—and potentially life-saving—way to repurpose your old mascara wands when you’re done with them. The Wands for Wildlife initiative is asking supporters to recycle their mascara wands to help save the lives of wild animals.

There’s clutter that’s obviously clutter: junk mail in stacks on the counter, toys with missing or broken parts, duplicate kitchen tools that never get used. And then there are the things that seem important or that aren’t as easy to get rid of as, say, tossing in the recycling bin or loading in the car for a drop off at the donation center. These things sit in our homes and take up valuable space in our drawers and in our minds when we encounter them.

It’s tough to stay on top of paper clutter. But what to do when you’re not sure if you’ll need an old bill or letter in the future, but you’re ready to KonMari the crap out of your paperwork? If you’re an iPhone user, then we have the solution for you. Get ready to have your mind blown, because thanks to Twitter user @wildchildlula, we now know that you can actually scan your paper documents into your Notes app—eliminating the need for a hard copy.

If there’s one thing we can all hope for from the Marie Kondo “Tidying Up” craze, it’s finally saying goodbye to the concept of retail therapy—a notion coined by the Chicago Tribune in the late 1980s with the idea that we had started “measuring out our lives in shopping bags and nursing our psychic ills.” In her show and book, Kondo has us thank and then get rid of the clutter that is no longer serving us.

Marie Kondo, the organizing queen du jour, bills tidying up as life-changing. But what happens when throwing away your belongings—even the more random odds and ends—sparks anything but joy? While there’s certainly something appealing about those KonMari’d spaces peppering Instagram, the truth is this magical organizing method simply doesn’t work for everyone. For some, more really is better—even designers agree.

Apartment Therapy Weekend Projects is a guided program designed to help you get the happy, healthy home you’ve always wanted, one weekend at a time. Sign up now for email updates so you never miss a lesson. In her most famous book, Marie Kondo revealed that she keeps her personal collection of books limited to less than 30. That statement got convoluted and incorrectly quoted as Kondo prescribing the same limit for everyone else in the world.

Apartment Therapy Weekend Projects is a guided program designed to help you get the happy, healthy home you’ve always wanted, one weekend at a time. Sign up now for email updates so you never miss a lesson. As Apartment Therapy’s cleaning editor, my number one job is to help our readers take care of their spaces. It has been so fun connecting with all of you during our group projects (like the January Cure) and on Instagram (I’m always here for questions!).

Just like finding the right eating method or exercise regimen, finding the right decluttering motto can be the key to keeping your home clutter-free. Many find an admonition by William Morris helpful when deciding what to keep and get rid of: “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” But this popular decluttering criterion could actually become a pitfall if you’re not careful.

You don't need to hire an expert or spend a bunch of cash on fancy containers to get your kitchen in working order.

To say that there’s been hype around the idea of decluttering and organizing is an understatement. This past January was not only a time to refresh your space and start anew (perhaps through our January Cure), but also marked the month that “Tidying Up With Marie Kondo” came into our lives, whether you let it in or not.

Your personality can help you focus your efforts on a certain thing or category of items, so you can dig in and really start to make an impact in your space.

I wish that we could all hit pause on our daily responsibilities, welcome the prim and utterly delightful Marie Kondo into the most intimate recesses of our homes, and KonMari all the clutter out of our lives. But Kondo’s method of “tidying up,” popularized (and demonized) once again by her show on Netflix, might not always be accessible to everyone—no matter how inspired they are to speak to their belongings and make mountains of their clothing.

Nothing is worse than coming home to a messy apartment after a long day, but finding the time to clean in the morning can be equally daunting. That’s why we put together a list of micro decluttering tasks that can easily be incorporated into your morning routine. Read ahead for seven super small ways to organize your space in the AM, so you can start the day off productively (and come home to a tidier place when it’s over). If you’re anything like me (i.e.

It’s no secret that clutter and anxiety are linked.

Wondering about the current KonMari craze? Here's our primer for all things Kondo.

And still preserve that spark of joy, of course.

It also made me want to run home and declutter, as is expected.

Sometimes all you need to declutter your space is a new frame of mind. Sounds easier said than done? Not so fast. Take a look at some of the best lessons we learned this year about how to live with less. You need to purge, but you might need that gigantic waffle maker at some point. Stop playing that game; you’ll never get the job done. Find out how washi tape can help: A Brilliant, Regret-Free Way You Can Use Tape to Declutter Your Kitchen. A marathon cleaning sesh only leads to fatigue.

The week between Christmas and New Year’s Day is usually a quiet one, so it’s the perfect time to go through your things and declutter. Between donating old pantry items and gently worn clothes, recycling gift boxes and catalogs, and tossing out old wine and leftovers, there’s plenty to clear out so you can make your home ready for the new year—and it’ll be conducive to helping you keep your resolutions.

A new year is about to start, and with that comes a new set of wardrobe needs with items that tend to be much bulkier and take up far more shelf space. If you’re hurting for storage, take a look around your closet and get rid of these items that you totally do not need anymore. If you haven’t worn that ketchup bottle getup since you bought it 10 years ago for your office Halloween party, it’s probably time to say goodbye.

Decluttering in December? Before you minimize your screen, hear us out. We get it: This time of year is super busy, and spring cleaning isn’t for another few months. But what better time to clear the way for better (and safer) things than before the year ends? Set yourself up for success (and less mess) in 2019 by taking some time to declutter now. Want to start 2019 off right? Sign up now for the January Cure. (it’s free!

Even where I live here in Florida, we’ve gotten out the sweaters and slipped on the Uggs. With warm weather truly behind us—December 21 is the official start of the winter season—it’s time to hunker down and savor the hygge. But the meaning of the kind of coziness that only this Danish word can describe doesn’t stop at chunky blankets and flickering flames. A big part of hygge revolves around contentment in simple things.

I have an impressive pile of cards in the back of my top desk drawer. They’re almost a Rolodex of my life for the past decade, with cards ranging from Macy’s gift cards given to us for our wedding to old insurance cards to local yogurt bar loyalty cards. I can’t just throw these cards out—they hold not only memories (especially when I’ve held on to them for this long!) but the possibility of hidden money.

We declutter mostly for ourselves. We yearn for the empty space and the room to breathe. So we approach our cupboards, closets, drawers, and garages asking ourselves whatever version of the essential question—do I need this?—that gives us the most clarity. That’s how we decide what to get rid of and what to keep most of the time. But there’s another way to think about it, and there are others to declutter for.

By taking a bit of time to go through everything in your bathroom today, you'll be able to shed things that you won't (or by this point, shouldn't) use.

Use it every day or mostly just pass it by with a glance of admiration, your dining table, while definitely made to be used, wasn’t made to be a catchall. As one of the largest non-floor surfaces in your home, however, it may hold its fair share of puzzles, art projects, and, at this time of year, gift-wrapping supplies. We’re big fans of using every part of your home and furniture to serve you and your needs.

When I told my husband that I was going to write an article about what to get rid of in the dining room, he said without out a breath of hesitation, “How about the dining room?” It’s a bit of “A Subject” at our house because I inherited my grandparents’ entire dining room (the only thing I didn’t keep is the chandelier), and we’ve been shipping it from home to home for a decade.

You’re here on Apartment Therapy, and that tells me one thing: You love looking to real people and real homes for inspiration on living well. You also probably love IKEA. And you’re for sure going to love these books. My usual IKEA M.O. involves skipping right past the showroom to get to the marketplace below, but on my last fateful trip, I found myself strolling by the book section (at the very end of the showroom right after the kids’ stuff, at least in my store).

Creativity starts at home. That’s why it’s important to know what kinds of things you can do around the house to get your creative juices flowing. We called on two of our favorite creative experts: Rahti Gorfien, Professional Certified Coach (PCC) and ACCG at Creative Calling Coaching and Danielle Raine, a U.K.-based creativity coach for advice on everyday habits that can help improve our creativity from the privacy of our own place, and they had lots to share.