Monday, August 1, 2016

How to Avoid Closet Catastrophe

I have a clothes problem. And accessory problem. And a shoe problem. Ok I might have a problem in general, but is it really an issue if you can fit it all in your closet? I have convinced myself it’s not, so in this blog post I will share a list of techniques to optimizing dorm room closet so that you can fit all those necessary shirts and accessories and etc.

Question your Closet:

So start off, when you are packing for Penn State go through your current closet and try to be honest with yourself: will you really ever wear this? This method could help cut down on the amount of clothes you bring. (I know it’s hard, but it’s worth a shot anyways)

The Seasonal Wardrobe:
Next comes the actual packing. So a technique I always used was to only bring a few fall/winter outfits with me on move-in day. This is because winter clothing is bulky and will take up a lot of space, and you won’t need it until the later in semester. The key to this technique though is knowing your parents will come visit you parent weekend or sometime in October to bring up the rest of your winter wardrobe and take home summer clothing. (winter will be coming at that point, you will need to brace yourself). Sidenote: make sure you pack the winter clothes you want in a bin or suitcase so your parents don’t have to go through your closet at home. (at least for me that would be a disaster).

Bling the Walls:
So out of all my clothing problems, my jewelry problem is definitely the worst. I have more earrings than I want to count. So the thought of how to transfer and store all this jewelry I have seemed very daunting. Luckily I came across this cute necklace and earring holder that goes directly onto a wall! (Of course you can’t use nails in a dorm room so I use command hooks instead). Now I have a place to store all my jewelry, which barely takes up any space and also works as a decoration! Anything that serves multiple purposes is an automatic win.
The Shoe Sorter:
For some reason, I had the need to bring every type of shoe I could ever need to college, which meant I had a nice shoe mountain at the bottom of my closet. After the first week or so, I decided I needed to stop this madness: I bought a shoe organizer. Now of course this shoe organizer could not fit all my shoes, but it was a good way to make the shoes I wouldn’t wear on a daily basis disappear to the deep depths of the closet. This way I could keep the shoes I needed to quickly grab all neatly lined up on the closet floor, while keeping those heels out of my way.
Don’t be the T-Shirt Hoarder:
You do not need all those T-shirts. I repeat, you do not need them. Your freshman year you will get so many free t-shirts it is unreal. Please do yourself a favor and only bring a select few with you. You will save yourself a lot of drawer space.

The Scarf Master:
I have way too many scarves. In the fall it’s a great thing because I can wear a different one everyday for a couple weeks. However, storing them could have been an issue if I did not have a handy dandy scarf hanger. Now my messy pile of scarves turned into a messy hanger of scarves, which is much better. (like the shoe organizer you can also hide this in the deep dark depths of the closet).

The Designated Drawer
In your dorm room you will have a dresser with probably around 5 drawers. Make sure you unpack and designate each drawer to have a certain type of clothing so you can quickly find whatever you need. For me the top drawer was always underwear and socks, the second was for shorts, third was for t-shirts, fourth was for jeans/pants, and bottom was for misc junk that I accumulated from career fairs and info sessions. I kept this system for the past two years, and it has been extremely helpful for putting away clothes and then finding them in a hurry when I’m almost late for class.


Well that’s all folks. Hopefully this was helpful in planning on how to store all the clothing you bring to State College. Welcome to the Penn State Family! :)

Elena Gowdy is a junior majoring in Architectural Engineering and is a Mentor for WEPO'16!

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