Bon Voyage & Welcome Home: The Ideal EntrywayWe leave in the morning and come back at night, but in the end, there really is no place like home.
Organizing your entryway can make the transition from inside to outside and back again smooth and effortless.
An entryway is filled with things that aren’t really meant for show. Backpacks, boots, jackets, keys; everything is functional. Compare this to a media center which is more of a showpiece. An entryway needs to be designed for ease of use and to prevent the space from quickly becoming an eyesore.
It’s important to have the proper accessories to store the myriad of items that belong in an entryway.
- Baskets are perfect for gloves and hats in the winter and for boots all year long.
- Incorporate hooks for coats, jackets, backpacks and purses. Keep in mind that you should only see garments for the current season hanging near the doorway. Light windbreakers and heavy down jackets shouldn’t hang side by side. Store out of season things somewhere else.
- Drawers are good for keys and wallets.
- If you’ve got the space, you could even build in a seat so it’s easy to put on and remove your shoes.
Once you organize your entryway, you’ll find that it’s less stressful when you leave the house and more relaxing when you come back home.
Isn’t that a lovely thought?
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Ginny Snook Scott
Ginny Snook Scott is the chief design officer at California Closets. She has over 25 years experience with California Closets and has helped over 1,000 clients create custom closets and organize their home. Connect with Ginny on Google+.
Creating The Perfect Laundry RoomAndrea Mikulec Crawford was recently charged with transforming a laundry room for a very busy working Mom and Dad with two young children.
She had previously worked with the couple and had created a storage solution for every room in their home except their laundry room. They were now living the California Closets lifestyle and knew it was a natural choice for their laundry room, as well. Function and organization was their priority, but they didn’t want to sacrifice style, either.
Andrea’s challenge was to design a space to do a multitude of things: store laundry supplies, dry hang clothes, brooms and dustpans, and ironing supplies. In addition to being functional and child safe, the space needed to be aesthetically pleasing.
As you can see, Andrea was able to fulfill all the couple’s storage needs. Tall cabinets housed the brooms and vacuum. The ironing board lives at end of cabinet. Space was given to a hamper, dry hanging pole, laundry supply storage in upper cabinets. Pretty shelf storage was incorporated for easy accessibility to cleaning supplies while giving the couple the option to hide unsightly bottles behind beautiful Ecoresin doors. Andrea was even able to allow some empty floor space for the dog bed.
Some of the design features Andrea included were raised panel doors with antique fleur Ecoresin inserts, a continuous base, crown molding, and matte aluminum spindle handles with matching poles.
The couple is thrilled with their new storage. With every room in their house containing a custom storage solution, what’s next?
The garage, perhaps?
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What do you think of this walk-in closet design? Do you like our Virtuoso Collection? Tell us in the comments!
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Andrea Crawford – Design Consultant
Andrea Mikulec Crawford has been a Design Consultant for California Closets Syracuse for six years. She enjoys the challenge of blending her creativity with the modern products and accessories that California Closets offers to solve her clients’ organizational solutions.
How Custom Can You Get? Housing An Office Aquarium SystemThere are common misconceptions about custom storage solutions. Many of us think that customization entails having adjustable shelves and not much more.
True customization incorporates imagination into a design and follows no set blueprint.
A good designer should be able to incorporate any existing element into a storage design – like this custom aquarium system located in our California Closets showroom in Hopkinton, MA.
An aquarium this big deserves to be a showpiece just like a huge flat-screen TV.
The issues that come with having a tank this large, however, are very different from those of a TV. You’ve got depth to contend with, in addition to a great deal of weight and the need to have access to the top for feeding and cleaning.
It’s easy to see how this storage solution was designed to fulfill all of the storage needs of the office while perfectly housing the community aquarium.
The counter that the tank rests on extends further than the surrounding cabinets and is supported below to handle the extra weight of the water. Space has been left on top so the designated caretakers can lift the lid to perform routine maintenance and feed the fish.
The unit was designed to manage the pump, power supply, and rubber tubing of the aquarium while keeping it all hidden away.
The cabinets under the tank hold all of the aquarium supplies such as fresh filters and food while the upper cabinets and drawers store office supplies, making this a truly multi-functional storage system.
California Closets employees Jessie (left) came up with the idea and Melissa (right) designed it. They both love how the aquarium adds movement and color to their office environment!
What do you have in your home that requires this level of customization? Has your mind changed about the feasibility of crafting a storage system to accommodate your trickiest design challenges?
Tell us in the comments!
If you’ve found this post helpful or inspiring, please share it with your family and friends!
Ginny Snook Scott
Ginny Snook Scott is the chief design officer at California Closets. She has over 25 years experience with California Closets and has helped over 1,000 clients create custom closets and organize their home. Connect with Ginny on Google+.
