Decluttering and Organizing Is Always The First Step Before A Renovation-Week # 1

“You don’t realize how much stuff you have until you try to put it all in a box.” -Allison Vesterfelt

Summer officially started last week.  For many of us this means longer, more casual days.  Summer is also traditionally the high season for remodeling projects.  Our design firm begins each project by evaluating how a space is used.  Decluttering and organizing an existing space will change the way a renovation is planned.

Decluttering Saves Money

In all honesty, some renovation projects could be less expensive and less invasive if we all had the good habit of decluttering.   Professional organizers, like our friend at Ashley Organizes, agrees with us that decluttering first allows her to create a long term solution to a storage problem.

Use Monday As Motivation To Declutter

We’d like to invite everyone to join us for the next few Mondays as we share some of the top areas we revamp for our clients before starting a renovation.  We challenge you to look at these same areas in your home, regardless if you are renovating, and perhaps declutter a bit.  Let’s use these longer days of summer to complete the organizing goals that have been nagging at us.

Organizing Beverage Vessels

Yep, this is exactly the way our iced coffees are served as we linger over them on the perfectly styled outdoor table with this cute little succulent nearby.  No?

In reality our cabinets are too full of coffee mugs that have reproduced with each other.  How did we get so many?  How many do we really use before we run the dishwasher.

Declutter Rule  # 1:  Toss It or Donate It Immediately

Get it out of the house.  Yes, the garage and basement are parts of the house.

Would it not be wonderful to have a coffee, tea or me entire cabinet?  Just look at this sweetie below.   With our designs, retrofit both existing and new cabinets with expandable shelves like the ones below to maximize all upper cabinets.

Expandable Cabinet Shelves

What about all the water bottles that also seem to be having babies in our cabinets?   It’s crazy to plan on having these stand up 3 deep in our upper cabinets.  With the lids on, they are top heavy and there are always a few too tall to fit in our shelves. Plus no one can ever get those blasted prefab cabinet shelf clips out to reset the shelves.  Go thru them now.  Toss the funky ones and consider a better storage system for the few you must keep.  Both the systems below house a lot of these travel tumblers.  Remember too, there will be new babies in the future.  Always.  That’s how we got so many to begin with.

Water Bottle Clear Storage Units

Declutter One Area A Week

What do you say?  If we start today, by September we could have 10 areas decluttered and organized and even have a bit of fun doing this!  Soon we will be able to follow The “One In One Out” Rule To Staying Organized!

Subscribe Now And Get All The Summer Tips On Organizing

Follow Us On Pinterest

Ways For A More Minimalistic Bathroom