Celeb closet ideas can work for anyone
Designer to the stars shares tips — even for those short on space
Lisa Adams knows your closet. Sure, she lives in Los Angeles, where she hangs out with famous people, outfitting them with spaces worthy of their expansive, designer-clothing-strewn wardrobes.
She has made them custom closets just for their colorful workout gear. She helped the Kardashians contain their formidable clothing collections before Kendall even learned to drive. She helped Christina Aguilera dream up a purse carousel inspired by (what else?) a stripper pole.
Still, Adams, author of “Closet Design Bible” and the designer behind LA Closet Design (that stands for Lisa Adams, she points out, not Los Angeles, but either way, the name works) says we’re not so different from her celebrity clients.
“People are living in a lot of cluttered, disorganized closets,” she says, “and they want better.” Closets, she points out, are one of the three spaces people look at when buying or renting a new place. They rank right behind the kitchen and the bathrooms in importance. And yet, when the spring cleaning bug hits, nearly all of us think immediately of the closet, that neglected spot where we suspect all the unnecessary baggage that has been holding us back since roughly the 1990s is lodged.
Researchers have confirmed your fears, because that’s their job. Studies have shown that the average woman has over $500 in unworn clothing lurking in her closet, that roughly 80 percent of our clothes are rarely worn — the other 20 percent includes that skirt you have worn to work three times this week.
Eighty-four percent of Americans report being stressed that their homes aren’t clean and organized enough. Good thing Adams is here to help, armed with the expertise she could only get when teaching celebrities to take a practical, organized approach to, say, a shoe collection that needs three layers of movable, library-style shelves to contain it.
Anyone can have a better closet, she says, even if you’re short of space. Here are her celebrityinspired closet tips:
When stylist and TV personality Brad Goreski called Adams in, she discovered that he had a standard-issue modular closet system from The Container Store. Her first fix? Simply shifting rods and shelves to create a space that fit his things, so that jackets, for instance, had enough height to hang properly without resting on the shelf below. “A lot of people move into a closet and think, ‘Oh, I’ll make it work,’ ” she says. Instead, look to see if existing elements can be reconfigured to give you storage that works better. Every closet, Adams says, needs “a cute little trash can that you don’t mind looking at” to catch the tags you snip off and other little garbage. She also advocates a permanent system to accept clothes meant for donation and the cleaners, as well as traditional laundry. Get a divided hamper, and drop items in as soon as you notice they no longer fit or need laundering. When the bin is full, head to your donation spot or the dry cleaners.
“The valet rod is God’s gift to us,” Adams says. If you’re not familiar with this pull-out wonder, a tiny rod that can hold clothes for a trip, a next day’s outfit, or the dry cleaning you just picked up (you are going to put that away, right?), you should look into it. “Container Store has one you can install yourself if you’re a renter,” says Adams. In a pinch, a sturdy hook or a repurposed towel bar can serve the same purpose. Know that under-cabinet lighting that keeps you from cutting off your finger when you’re slicing carrots? Try it above your closet rods, where the light it sheds will mean you can always tell navy blue jackets from black ones. Mimic grandma’s old-fashioned cup hooks with slightly larger ones under closet shelves, so that purses can hang, instead of flopping over or lying flat, hidden from view. “We don’t wear what we can’t see,” Adams says.
Adams never gives up that lost real estate at the top of the closet. If you’ve got the cash, she says, invest in pull-down rods (you can even get ones that lower at the push of a button). Or stick with shelves, but keep it neat and make peace with your stepladder. “Get a pretty one,” she says, “and have a place to store it for when you want it out of the way.”
Wallpaper or mirror the back wall, clean up the look with matching hangers, or even spring for luxury rods and hardware in finishes like acrylic or brass. You can even style an empty shelf, if you have one, with a favorite object or artwork. “When you open the door to a closet,” says Adams, “you want that feeling of ‘Oh, it’s beautiful!’ It needs to exude that.”