My Favorite Organizing Shortcuts
When it comes to home organizing, I take the “less is more” approach 99% of the time. Why? Visual clutter overwhelms me like being trapped in a crowd in Times Square. Beyond this, I always seek the most elegant solution to home organizing. The one that requires minimal effort, the least amount of steps, and the most amount of relief for being so satisfyingly easy yet effective.
Call it laissez-faire, I call it laissez-chic. Laissez-chic is owning five to six cleaning products instead of fifty. It’s tossing your keys in the same little tray every time so you don’t spend the rest of your day excavating your home in search of them.
Here are some very satisfying shortcuts to keep your home organized and clean for the new year (and every year thereafter, because these shortcuts are here for the long haul!):
1. Pre-sort your light and dark laundry. Make laundry day less painful by tossing your light and dark clothes in their own hampers. This way, you’ll spend less time sorting through that tangled mess of leggings and towels. Something like this hamper works. If you’re a visual person, these black and white hampers from Design Within Reach are fun and neat. Don’t be fooled by their smallish size—they hold a LOT of laundry (but hopefully you’ll do laundry often enough not to let it get to that level of poundage).
2. Keep a donation bin at the bottom of your closet. Allow me to get on my soapbox (or donation bin) yet again to discuss the many wonders of this trick. If you come across clothes you don’t like or no longer fit, instead of hanging it up right back up in your closet, toss it in the bin. Once it’s full, send the contents off to The Real Real/thredUP, and donate the rest to your local Salvation Army. The endless cycle of trying on that ill-fitting pair of jeans ends now! Take it as a learning experience and allow yourself to move on (i.e., never again with the sequined gauchos etc. etc.).
3.Create a command center in your entryway. I touched on this small yet MIGHTY tip in my intro, but we’re back to chat more about it because it’s so useful. Give your mail, keys, wallet, and masks a place to live in your entryway. You can plop them on a floating shelf, an entryway organizer, or my fave, a console table topped with a few chic trays. The choice is yours. Spare yourself the future grief of dealing with paper clutter (sort through the mail in the entryway), and avoid repeatedly playing the game, “where’s my wallet and keys?!”
4. Keep your styling tools in a bin. I might be in the minority here, but I don’t like blow drying my hair in my bathroom. I like to spread out and fling the hair dryer everywhere along with my hair, which isn’t as possible to accomplish in a bathroom. I recommend tossing your hair tools in a comfortably sized bin (I’m a fan of the rattan), and then just grabbing it out of the bin when you need it. It beats nestling it in this cramped tray every time, or shoving it underneath your bathroom cabinet. I keep mine in my closet, since it’s next to an outlet in the hall, but that’s just moi.
5. When in doubt, hook it out. Me again on my soapbox talking about the wonders of hooks. Instead of rifling through your drawers, cabinets or closets for items you use routinely, just keep that stuff on a hook already. Adhesive hooks can be attached to the inside of your closet doors with no installation required. Use them to hang everything from little umbrellas, hats, robes, and purses. In your kitchen you can use them to hang extra plastic bags, oven mitts, even measuring cups. Is this hook the nicest thing you’ve ever seen? NOPE! That’s why it’s hidden behind a cabinet. But it is one of the easiest organizing tools you’ve ever seen!
6. File fold your winter accessories. Lest your hats and gloves and coats become a massive ball of yarn in your closet, keep them stacked and call it a day. You can stack them side by side in a bin or in a drawer. Either way, you won’t lose track of your accessories, or be too lazy to go rifling through your accessories so you’re stuck wearing the same drab scarf all winter. All you have to do is fold your scarf and toss it in the bin, or drawer. Not so bad, right? Better than folding thongs every time.
7. Stay in the clear. I’m not one to wax poetic about the beauty of acrylic and plastic, but sometimes function is more important than form. That’s where these acrylic makeup organizers come in. This one is narrow enough to sit comfortably in my medicine cabinet, so I don’t have to see its garishness out all the time. But I love it nonetheless because I’m able to see all my makeup at once, which beats keeping everything in a cavernous toiletry bag where eyeliners and mascaras go to die. This is a chic solution to the age old problem of makeup clutter. Now, I see it, I apply it, I wear it, finit.