I Love Lamp: A Dreamy Closet Begins

I am a lucky girl for a bajillion reasons. Including the fact that I have an entire ROOM for a closet...! The previous owners have 5 kids, so all of the upstairs rooms used to be bedrooms. And they had to get creative with space, hence loft beds with storage built in like our former "crazy" room I just had a go at--

But Steven and I don't have 5 children quite yet, so we've got guest rooms and closet rooms, haha!

And while I loved how much space my closet room had, it wasn't actually as efficient as I wanted it to be and had some unfinished bits that needed some loving. Here's what it was looking like pretty much since we moved in:

What I really wanted, was to get that dang loft out. It was bulky and those storage shelves went really far back but were basically unaccessible past a first row of clothing.

Enter, Steven and his tool box. (Yes, I could have used the tools too but Steven was pretty amped for some demo!)

Some parts were screwed in, like the top and some of the front boards, which was great because all we had to do was unscrew 'em and pop 'em off.

Unfortunately, some parts were nailed together. Which mean we just had to get kind of aggressive. And for that, Steven brought out his maul:

Meanwhile, I was filling the former "crazy room" room I'd JUST emptied with every single piece of clothing I own SIGH.

Steven kept at it while Waldo and I mostly got in the way.

Although then again I don't know. Because below is the exact moment he said, "This is totally a two person, one dog job."

And then TADA!

SO. MUCH. FREAKING. WOOD. It took approximately three thousand trips up and down our steep stairs to get it all out of there.

At this point we decided to quit when we were ahead and call it a day. Order some Chinese food. Oh wait, there's no take out here. So we made some instead.

The next morning I rolled out of bed and grabbed a paint brush. White, white, white, shiny and bright on the ceiling, the trim, and the walls. I only took one progress shot:

Then it was time to have a go at the floors that had taken an uneven beating over the years. The other week I did the living room floor with olive oil, white vinegar, and warm water and it looked amaaaaaazing so I did the same thing here.

Yes, the place smells a bit like a salad for a few hours but it's totally worth it!

Next up was bringing all my clothes back into this room. But in order to do that right, I needed to make a plan. Shelves? Racks? Armoires? I thiiiiink I've decided on a combination of one long rack on the right wall, a series of shoe shelves on the left, and a whole bunch of shelves in the actual closet which will have a door.

So I started bringing clothes back in, piece by piece, asking myself each time: Do I wear this? Do I love this?

I had to add the second question because here the usual "Have you worn it in the past 6 months?" strategy doesn't work because there aren't quiiiite as many opportunities in the country for, say, silk dresses as there are in the city. But does that mean I should toss them? NO EFFING WAY.

Still, I managed to eliminate an entire contractor's bag worth of clothes and oh my gosh does it feel goooooood.

So we're getting there. Bit by bit, day by day.

Hopefully I'll be able to show you photos of a finished closet in the next few weeks. And hopefully I'll be able to actually wear some of those dresses pictured above in the next few weeks too! Seems almost reasonable-- I saw my first patches of BARE GROUND today:

And to wrap it up, a little Before and nearly After for you:

(What is I Love Lamp? This is I Love Lamp.)