Closet Room Makeover

When you live in a house built in the 1950's you have to expect that you aren't going to get a walk-in closet. Our 'master' bedroom is really only built to house a double bed and the closet is so small that only Chad's things fit in there comfortably. I imagine in the 50's when you only had 5 or 6 outfits a couple's things would have had more than enough room...but 5 or 6 outfits I do not have! The second bedroom upstairs is really tiny and when we toured the house it had a single bed, a dresser and a chair.

I immediately started to think about my dream closet scenario, the one where I dedicate an entire room to my clothes, a real walk in closet- a dressing room- where I could twirl around in dresses, plan my outfits for the next day and never leave piles of clothes on the floor again. Here was my inspiration:

Clockwise from top: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Obviously my original inspiration was to have Chad install an Ikea wardrobe on one side of the room and mount a hanging rod under the sloped roof exactly like in the first picture. Unfortunately, those wardrobes are not cheap and Chad's willingness to continually build and/or install things also has it's limits. The good news is it may get done in the future (right Chad?) but for now I think it's working just fine. Another plus is that if we ever move it can be easily turned back into a bedroom. 

I'll skip showing you the in-between phase - where my clothes got covered in renovation dust and it became the room where unused furniture went to die. I rushed to finish up the room before the photo shoot a few weeks ago because it was definitely not photo worthy. In order to stretch the budget, I re-used paint from other projects around the house, re-used some hand-me-down and flea market furniture and scored some great things on super sale at Target and West Elm. 

In order to play up the sloped back wall and add some interest, I painted a half wall using paint left over from the bedroom. The top half of the wall and ceiling are both painted white (even if it looks a bit blue in the photos). I found the rug on sale at West Elm and in a happy little accident, it perfectly matched the wall colour. From there I added a few touches of black through the chandelier, hooks and dresser knobs to tie into the black clothes racks I already had. The bench was my best deal at only $30 and doubles as a much fought over cat bed. I used a mirror and dresser that my sister had left me and made sure to leave room to highlight the dress mannequin I scored for less than a hundred dollars from the Brimfield Flea Market last year.  Here are the sources or similar options to get the look:

1. Paint Colour
2. Bench
3. Rug
4. Chandelier
5. Knobs
6. Curtains
7. Mirror
8. Clothes Racks
9. Hooks
10. Boxes (on dresser)
11. Dress Form/Mannequin (similar) 

Now my clothes feel organised and I actually like going in there. I make an effort to put my clothes away and not let them pile on the floor (we'll see how long that lasts) and I've even spent a little time planning outfits as opposed to grabbing whatever is lying in said pile on the floor. So what about you? Do you have a walk-in closet, a tiny hole in the wall or a whole room devoted to your wardrobe? Let me know how you keep it organised and if making it pretty made it easier for to get ready in the morning.