Closet Annex

You all know I have a lot of clothing. Our apartment has minimal closet space, so I gradually gave up on the idea of being able to keep everything in one place. I bought a pop-up closet so I could store suits and other things I don't wear often in the basement. Later I added a second one for winter coats and other out of season items.

But I bought cheap ones, and I made the mistake of overloading them. Gradually their top frames warped from the weight, one tipped over, and the other blew out its back seam. A couple of months ago I bought two replacements from The Container Store that have heavier-weight canvas exterior shells. I put them in the basement and kind of forgot about them.

With the very pleasant weather we've been having this week, it's nice and comfortable in the basement, so I decided Thursday that I had procrastinated long enough, and headed downstairs to put the things together. While doing so I also set aside some things that I no longer want, and some things I want to try to sell. I also did a little reorganization of how I was storing things.

The new pop-ups have the same sort of frames as the old ones, so I decided to pay more attention to how much I put in them so they are not overloaded. My suits and sport coats are now hanging with enough space that they won't get wrinkled. Plus, after shifting everything around, I realized that I had enough usable pieces left over from the two old ones that I was able to cobble together a third unit, which I'm using to hold all the things that are going to be sold.

The new units also came with corrugated panels for the tops and bottoms, so it's possible to store things that are in boxes, like a couple of straw hats I have. Again I wouldn't use these "shelves" for anything heavy, but it's nice to have the additional area.

It felt good to do something productive, but I still have a lot of stuff downstairs that I have to deal with.