The decluttered home

How to Declutter Your Home: 6 Best Room-by-Room Methods

Set the overwhelming feeling aside by starting with small steps

Elizabeth Larkin

Elizabeth Larkin is a professional organizer with a strong interest in productivity, time management, and process refinement. She used her organizational skills and effectiveness to pen articles with helpful information on cleaning, organizing living spaces, and decluttering.

Learn more about The Spruce's Editorial Process

Updated on 09/27/22

Reviewed by

Katherine Picott

Reviewed by Katherine Picott

Katherine is a professional home organizer, certified KonMari consultant, and member of The Spruce's Cleaning and Organizing Review Board. She launched her own professional organizing business, Tidy Milso, in the summer of 2020, to help reorient those feeling overwhelmed with both clutter and disorganization in their homes.

Learn more about The Spruce's Review Board

The Spruce / Letícia Almeida

Whether you're downsizing or just trying to simplify your life, figuring out how to declutter your home is a big job. The best way to start decluttering when you're overwhelmed is to do it in stages. Make a "declutter your home checklist" to prioritize clutter areas. Focus on one room, or even one zone within a room (e.g., kitchen cabinets), at a time. And complete each job fully before moving on to the next space.

Before you start to declutter your home, have containers defined for the following purposes to sort items:

Put away: Items that have crept out of their designated storage spaces
Fix/mend: Items that need something before they're put away, such as a shirt with a missing button
Recycle: Items that can be recycled
Trash: Items to throw away in the household trash
Donate: Unwanted items that are still in good condition and can be donated to a charitable organization or another person

Here's how to put these containers to use while decluttering each room in your home.

Click Play to Learn How to Get Rid of Stuff With These Pain-Free Strategies

Creating a Decluttering Timeline

If you don't have a lot of stuff, it might be possible to declutter your house in one day or on a weekend. Or you might want to create a longer timeline to declutter your house in 30 days, for example. You can also plan a decluttering schedule just for the weekends you have in a month if you wish.

Keep your goals realistic and attainable, so you can declutter your home without feeling overwhelmed. Break down the spaces you need to declutter, estimating how long each will take. And then organize that into your overall timeline. Give yourself some buffer time in case something doesn't go according to plan.

What you should not do when decluttering is pull out all of your stuff without a plan for how you're going to sort it. If you do that, you'll likely just waste time wading through all of your disorganized items. In addition, it's often best to clean first before you declutter, so your everyday items are tidy and out of the way.

Consider starting in a room or space with only a small amount of clutter. That way, you can get it done quickly and feel like you're making progress on your overall decluttering timeline, which should in turn motivate you to keep going.

01 of 06
The Bathroom

The Spruce / Erica Lang

Start with your medicine cabinet. Take everything out, and discard outdated medications, makeup, and skincare products. Put everything you're keeping immediately back into the cabinet, storing the items you use most often at eye level.
Next, move onto any cabinet drawers. Remove everything, and do a quick evaluation of what you're keeping and what you're tossing. Put the items you're going to keep back into their drawers, with the items you use most often in the top drawers.
Now, do the same routine with your shower/tub. Finally, pull everything out from below your bathroom sink, and declutter the items there.
Lastly, everything that did not have a home can be quickly sorted into the five bins you have staged for the purpose.
10 Quick Tips to Organize and Declutter a Bathroom
02 of 06
The Bedroom

The Spruce / Letícia Almeida

First, make your bed. It's hard to feel any progress decluttering a bedroom while an unmade bed stares you in the face.
Start with your nightstands. Remove anything on them that doesn’t belong there, and put it in your put-away bin. This may include books you’ve already finished reading, pens and paper, and mail. Throw out or recycle anything that you no longer use, such as empty tissue boxes, pens that have gone dry, or chargers that no longer work.
Do the same with the tops of your dressers, chests, and/or bureaus. Pay careful attention to any clothing that is strewn about. Anything that needs folding or hanging goes into the put-away bin. If you're afraid it may wrinkle further, you can lay clothes on your bed.
Go through each bureau, drawer by drawer. Take everything out. Pull out anything that is no longer worn, and put it in your donation bin. Fold and store the clothing you're keeping.
If you keep a desk or vanity table in your bedroom, tackle that next. Resist the urge to shove things back into drawers; instead, put them in your put-away bin. Toss or recycle any garbage or anything you haven’t used in more than six months.
Return items to their proper places. Fold or hang and store any clothing. If you're now eyeing your closet, we'll tackle that next.
9 Bedroom Organizing Tips to Use Right Now
03 of 06
Closet and Clothing

The Spruce / Letícia Almeida

OK, deep breath. It's time to declutter your closet. The easiest way to tackle a closet is to first declutter your clothing by type. That means start with shoes, then boots, then dresses, then denim, etc.
It’s much easier to decide to toss or keep a pair of jeans if you’re looking at your entire jeans collection at once. So start pulling out different types of clothing, and decide what you'll toss and keep.
Once you’ve gone through each type of clothing, you will have four piles to deal with:
- Put away anything that was simply in the wrong spot. Example: If you had a pair of socks in your closet, put them in your dresser.
- Put any dirty laundry into the hamper, or bring it to the laundry room.
- Anything that needs to be repaired should go to the tailor or dry cleaner.
- To get rid of clothes, take them to a donation center or consignment store.
How to Declutter the Clothes in Your Closet
04 of 06
The Entryway, Mudroom, and Foyer

The Spruce / Christopher Lee Foto

You may not have a traditional mudroom or foyer, but you definitely have an entryway. No matter how small it is, the best way to make an entryway most functional is to declutter it regularly.
Start with any desk, console, or side tables you have in your entry. Go through each drawer, removing the contents, and make a quick decision to toss or keep each item. Go over the tops of each desk or console as well. Do you have a space for your keys and other important items? Make sure everything is accessible and not too crowded. This will make it easier to leave the house with what you need each morning.
The hall closet should be decluttered like any other closet: Start with shoes and boots, then jackets, followed by accessories.
The entry is another area that picks up a lot of clutter from other rooms. Spend time putting away things from other rooms that have made their way to the entry.
7 Essential Design Elements for a Stylish and Organized Entryway
05 of 06
The Kitchen

The Spruce / Letícia Almeida

Keeping your kitchen clutter-free can be a challenge because so many different activities occur there—cooking, eating, and socializing. As a result, the kitchen has many different types of items stored in it. You can choose to declutter your kitchen by focusing on one category of item at a time (cutting boards, glassware, utensils, or bakeware, for example) or going by zone through each part of the kitchen.
The first step is to completely empty each space, assess each item, and put everything back where it belongs. Start with your powerhouse storage spaces first, such as the pantry and upper cabinets. Then move onto the lower cabinets, drawers, and the space under the kitchen sink.
The 11 Best Under-Sink Organizers of 2022
Finally, concentrate on your countertops. Move as many items as possible off of the countertops and into storage spaces. Keep only what you use every single day on the countertops.
Finally, take your put-away bin, and return anything that doesn't belong in the kitchen to its rightful storage space elsewhere in the house.
8 Ways to Declutter a Small Kitchen
06 of 06
The Living Room

The Spruce / Letícia Almeida

The living room is one of the hardest rooms in your home to keep neat on a daily basis. That's because it gets a lot of use, and living rooms don't usually offer a lot of storage features. You may have some bookcases and a TV console, but they don’t hide much. The key is to:
- Decide on permanent storage spaces for commonly used items, such as remote controls, magazines, and books.
- Declutter this space regularly.
Start with bookcases, console, and side tables. Then move on to your coffee table and entertainment center. Empty them, assess the items they store, and then return them to their proper storage spaces. Put books away; reduce paper clutter, such as mail; return remote controls to their proper places; fold blankets; etc.
Move on to electronics. Remove everything that is not connected to your television or home theater system. Are you using it? Does it work? Store items such as chargers and gaming equipment where you use them.
Finally, tackle the toys. Assess every toy for wear and tear. Does it still function? Do your kids still play with it? Recycle or store each toy.
Grab your put-away bin, and return everything that belongs in another room to its proper storage space.
How to Organize a Living Room

Where to Dispose of Clutter

For the items you aren’t keeping when you declutter your home, you have some options regarding how to dispose of them. This is where it can be extremely helpful if you’ve already sorted appropriate items into recycle, trash, and donate bins.

Make sure you are aware of your local recycling guidelines, as certain items, such as electronics, often can’t go in the regular recycling. Keep a separate bin for those items to bring them to an appropriate recycling center. Moreover, if you know you’ll be undertaking a major decluttering project, you might want to rent a dumpster in advance for unusable items that must be thrown away.

Remember that items in good condition can be donated or sold. Besides a donation bin, you also might want to start a collection of items to sell in a garage sale. Furthermore, if you plan to give away certain items to friends and family, it can be helpful to start bins for each person to fill as you declutter.

Watch Now: 8 Easy Things to Get Rid of Now to Declutter Your Home

58 Home Organization Projects That Take 10 Minutes or Less

Elizabeth Larkin

Learn more about The Spruce's Editorial Process

Updated on 08/15/22

The Spruce / Meg MacDonald

Home organization projects that only take 10 minutes may not seem like they are worth the effort. While you may think that you need to carve out a weekend or an entire week to organize your home or get your life organized, all you really need is to find those little pockets of time present in each day.

In fact, you can accomplish a lot in 10 minutes, especially if you focus on one small area. It’s amazing how much organizing you can complete in your kitchen in just 10 minutes, and ditto for your bathroom and clothes closet.

Think about how many times during the week you are presented with time in a 10-minute increment: waiting at the doctor's office, waiting to pick your kids up at school, or waiting for that pot to boil. Stop waiting and start doing with this list of ways to be more organized 10 minutes—or less.

The 11 Best Under-Sink Organizers of 2022

10-Minute Chunks of Time Are Everywhere

Think about all the 10-minute chunks of time that pop up throughout the day:

Waiting for everyone to finish brushing their teeth in the morning
The first 10 minutes after you walk through the door
Sitting in the waiting room before an appointment
Waiting for a pot to boil or cheese to melt

Break Large Projects Into 10-Minute Segments

Say you need to organize your bathroom but you can't find a full three-hour chunk of time on your calendar to set aside. While you may not be able to do the whole room all at once, you can complete a whole-room bathroom organization in incremental, 10-minute projects: Tasks such as inventorying toiletries, decluttering under the sink, washing your makeup brushes, and so on can take just a few minutes and move you closer to a more organized space with every project.

If you’re sold on the idea but still unsure where to begin, put yourself to work by completing one of these tasks. Whether you're in the kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, or at your computer, follow these steps to help you become more organized—quickly and fairly painlessly.

Go through your dresser and choose one drawer: Take everything out, refold the contents, and neatly stack them.
Choose one collection (athletic equipment, tools, cleaning supplies, etc.) and declutter: Toss or recycle anything you no longer use.
Vacuum your car: Throw away any large pieces of trash, then quickly vacuum the upholstery.
Install hooks in your garage: Use them to hang beach chairs, tools, or bikes.
Declutter the top drawer of your night table: Dust, tidy, and purge your nightstand of anything you no longer need.
Create a fitness drawer in your dresser: Gather your yoga pants, tank tops, sports bras, and specialty items, and place them all in the same spot.
Save important people’s contact info on your smartphone: This will help you in case of an emergency. For instance, put your mom's information under her full name, but enter a second entry for Mom. Another idea is to save a contact called *Emergency contacts. Using the * means this person will come up first in your address book in case someone else needs to get help for you using your phone.
Walk around your home and gather light bulbs, batteries, and stamps: Make sure you store these in the same spot so you don't buy more than you need.
Organize business cards: Gather these cards and any addresses you've written down and add them to your contacts list.
Organize your T-shirt drawer: Purge any shirts that have holes (or transfer them to function as garage rags), then neatly fold the remaining shirts.
Go through one file drawer and declutter: Recycle old papers, shred credit card statements, and refile anything out of place.
Store your receipts: Sit at your desk, open your wallet, and input receipts into your filing system.
Take 10 minutes to go through your calendar: RSVP to any hard copy and electronic invites.
Purge your fridge of anything rotten: Try to schedule this just before it's time to bring your trash cans to the curb for trash pick-up. That way, the rotten food doesn't stink up your kitchen.
Declutter your desktop: Make sure that your favorite writing utensils are neatly organized.
Organize your social media in one place: Move your Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, Linkedin, and Instagram apps to the same cluster or page on your phone.
Declutter your Facebook profile and check your privacy settings: Peruse your Facebook friends—this is a good reminder of who's seeing your personal information, pictures, and reading your status updates. Un-friend anyone who should not be seeing your vacation pictures.
Walk around your home and collect any loose change: Empty pockets, drawers, and wallets. Put all change into a bag. Next, store it with your laundry supplies to use at the laundromat, in your car for parking meters or tolls, or in your car to take to the bank to deposit.
Spend 10 minutes organizing your freezer and labeling contents: Go through your freezer, weeding out anything with freezer burn. For what's left, if you didn't label and date it when you placed it in the freezer, label and date it now and pledge to go through it every few months. If you still haven't used these items, go ahead and toss them. Clean the ice makers and ice trays.
Organize your entertainment: Make a list of movies and TV shows you'd like to see and add it to your phone's notes app. This saves time when you decide to watch a movie but can’t think of what you want to watch.
Declutter one desk drawer: Toss gum wrappers and pens without ink. Group like items together for easier retrieval.
Draft a general email and save it in your draft file: This is a great tool when you hear from someone you haven't seen/spoken to in a while. This can help you respond to those "So how are you?" emails.
Purge your Instagram account: Unfollow people or accounts that no longer interest you.
Clean your makeup brushes: Wash them with antibacterial soap and allow them to dry while laying flat on a washcloth.
Match up and organize your socks: Set any single socks aside. The next time you do laundry, see if you can find any missing pairs.
Create a spot for incoming mail: Make sure you have the tools in place to manage your mail when you walk in the door with it.
Delete old addresses: Go through your smartphone, hard copy, or electronic address book and take out old contacts—especially ex-boyfriends, ex-girlfriends, or anyone else your phone should not be "accidentally" dialing.
Donate books: Go through one bookshelf in your home and remove any books you've read but don't plan to read again or books you don't think you'll ever read. Take them to the nearest Little Free Library and leave them for someone else to enjoy.
Do a clutter sweep: Sit on the couch in your living room and look for any distracting piles. Declutter them.
Find a storage space for something in your living room: What's on your coffee table that needs to be put away?
Label cables: Grab the label maker, and label the cables behind your entertainment console.
Delete old shows and movies: Go through your lists or queues on Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, or whatever streaming platform(s) you use, and remove shows and movies you've watched and don't plan to watch again or that you're no longer interested in watching.
Stack and store magazines in a tray: Make sure you first recycle any you haven't gotten around to reading in the last six months—are you really going to read them someday? For magazines you've already read, pull out any coupons and recipes you want to keep (and file them), then recycle them as well.
Gather your throw pillow and blankets: Fold and stack your blankets and rearrange your throw pillows on the couch or chair they belong to.
Organize your remote controls: Gather and label your remotes with the name of the corresponding device: speakers, television, and so on.
Face your books: Go through your book collection, turning each volume in the same direction. This process is called "facing," and it’s used in retail stores to make everything look neat and organized.
Choose a room that needs extra work: Get your calendar out and plan. What resources do you need to get that done? When do you have time to accomplish this? Plan ahead.
Just store one type of item: Peruse home storage ideas and store one item in your home that has been just hanging around, such as paper towels or toiletries.
Recycle some electronics—the right way: Do you have an older item (television, gaming system, or VCR) that you're not sure how to recycle? Find your item, and schedule a time to recycle it if you're not dropping it off immediately to be recycled.
Measure the inside of each closet in your house: Write down the dimensions—depth, width, and height—of each space, shelf, nook, and cranny on an index card, one per closet, and store them in your wallet or phone. The next time you're in a store buying closet accessories, you'll have the information you need with you.
Gather all of your umbrellas: Store them together, preferably by the front door or door to the garage.
Go through your luggage: Remove any leftover papers, gum wrappers, or clothes/toiletries you forgot to unpack.
Create a meal plan for next week: Do this while looking in your kitchen cabinets, fridge, and pantry to maximize what you already have.
Edit your web browser bookmarks: Chances are you haven't looked at these in a long time.
Unsubscribe from blogs and emails you no longer read: A simple email search should bring up most of them, or you can use a free service like Unroll.me.
Declutter your email inbox: Go through your computer and smartphone, and get rid of as many un-needed emails as possible.
Create and designate a place to leave your keys: A few ideas for spots include a cake stand, hooks, a small tray, a decorative plate, and an old cigar box.
Gather mail from around your house: Divide it into three piles: action, recycle, and shred.
Choose one item to return to its rightful storage space: This can include scarves, hats, handbags, and coats.
Identify a bin, basket, tray, or box you can designate as an "outgoing" container: These containers can hold anything you need when you leave the house, such as school papers, outgoing mail, permissions slips, and work papers.
Inventory paper products: Take a look at toilet paper, paper towels, and napkins to see if you're running low.
Pull five items out of your closet that you haven’t worn in two years: Do you still need these? If not, fill a bag or box to donate to a local charity.
Organize your desktop files: If you’re following an effective home filing system, you know how important an organized desktop is. Spend 10 minutes sorting and organizing.
Create a checklist for everything you need for your next vacation: Do you need to replace luggage, stock up on toiletries, or renew your passport?
Find all of your reusable grocery bags, and store them together in the same spot: Consider keeping them in the car, and hang them on the doorknob once you empty them so you can take them back to the car.
Grab any three bags, such as backpacks, gym bags, or purses: Dump them out and then sort the contents into four piles: trash, recycle, shred, and keep.
Shred or recycle any mail: This includes magazines, flyers, or extra paper sitting around your entryway.
Declutter your paper: Recycle old invitations and get rid of expired coupons and any other clutter.

The Spruce / Meg MacDonald

Know that 10 minutes is more than enough to make a dent in home organization, office organization, or life organization. Try it out and see how much can you accomplish in a small amount of time.

15-Minute Cleanups for Every Room

Nothing in excess: the importance of getting rid of trash

Nothing in excess: getting rid of trash - in this article you will learn how to simplify maternity everyday life with the help of decluttering.

Where do we draw strength? In a good rest, in communication with loved ones, in dreams, in motivation and ... in the surrounding space. When it is cluttered with unnecessary household items, energy and time are wasted fighting the clutter. Especially a lot of things in a house with a small child.

Clothing, toys and children's furniture are together reclaiming a part of the territory that has long been occupied before them. If the family had a lot of things before, then the appearance of a new person with his “suitcase” increases their number by at least a third. And the young mother demonstrates miracles of ingenuity in trying to maintain order (and sanity) in a new and rather cramped environment. Taming Scattered Toys: A Collection of Tips for Moms

Women with small children get very tired working from home, from endless cleaning, cooking and laundry. Household chores take up a lot of time. Days fly by, and the baby quickly begins to crawl, and then walk, and young parents get the impression that every 5 minutes a small tornado sweeps through the house: everything is upside down.

In addition to cleaning up after the little explorer, mom dusts, mop the floor, vacuums, cooks and does the laundry. All this is exhausting. How to make cleaning easier and where to get the strength to do everything? You can make the house a source of additional resource for mom. And the first necessary step is to get rid of the trash.

In the power of disorder

Remember how many times you tried, despite the many things in the house with a child and the research zeal of the crumbs, to restore at least a semblance of order. If, despite all efforts, the result is not visible, then you are trying to organize the trash. And this is impossible, because he will not go anywhere, but will only move from place to place.

What is considered trash? Rubbish is the dominance of unnecessary things. Some of them, for example, for children, are necessary from the beginning of their appearance. But, as the baby grows, they lose their relevance and turn into rubbish that devours time, collects dust and steals strength. And things acquired before his birth do not add energy. That's why mom gets so tired doing the cleaning in a cluttered house. Why are the extra things so annoying?

A cluttered house interferes with the normal organization of time.
You have to spend extra minutes, or even hours, looking for the right things.
The situation is demotivating, because if the house is a mess, then the cleaning result is less noticeable.
The air is filled with dust.
In a cluttered room, it is more difficult to move around, do business and relax.

Junk has a depressing property of constantly growing, forcing out the owners of the territory. He throws off the rhythm of work, forcing you to trip over unnecessary things and endure them in the house in case they come in handy. Even so, the harm from such stocks is more than good. For a clutter-free life, it's time to start getting rid of them. Dishwasher: the main assistant in your kitchen

Life without junk

Even before the birth of the baby, the family manages to acquire valuable property. Over time, a lot of things come into the house with the birth of a child. If earlier magazines were piled up in the closet, the wardrobe was bursting with clothes, and the shelves were inhabited by photographs, figurines and souvenirs, now heaps of sliders and diapers, stacks of children's books, a rocking horse and a sea of rubber ducks have joined them.

It is no wonder that operational cleaning takes about two hours, the search for the necessary things takes half a day, and you can dig in the closets - otherwise you won’t remember what is stored there.

There is only one way out - to get rid of trash. What will it give?

Cleaning will be twice as easy and faster.
You will save time on getting ready, looking for the right things and organizing leisure activities.
You will have more energy and a better state of mind.
Less cleaning - more free time.
In a cozy home, all questions and problems are solved more easily.
Easier to deal with the damage children cause to the environment.
In the process of sorting through the rubble, you will find a lot of wanted items.
You will set a good example for the children and begin to teach them to order.

Keep in mind that sorting things out is a long-term process, especially if there are too many of them. But it will definitely pay off. Spend time now and save a lot later. Where to start if you are already tired of endless cleaning at home? 3 best ways to fill yourself with energy for a woman

Where to start (and how to continue)?

The main thing is to start. Choose a place that you have long wanted to dismantle and get down to business.

Stick to simple principles:

1. Think of junk fighting as a project and plan it . Before disassembling, think carefully about what and where it will be convenient for you to store. Leave yourself a temporary reserve in case at any stage the cleaning is delayed.

2. Then throw in the trash those things that you have long wanted to throw away.

3. Determine the cleaning order and proceed with the disassembly. There are two approaches: the first one is analysis by places, the second one is by types of things.

In the first case, the most frequently used areas are dismantled. This method has a significant drawback: items evicted from their homes will “migrate” to other territories, where sooner or later you will have to deal with them again.

The essence of the second method is to sort things of one kind every day: today - all bags, tomorrow - cosmetics, the day after tomorrow - toys. The result of parsing by type is not immediately noticeable, but it is more stable.

4. Don't try to beat the trash in one day!

5. Grab small areas of so that, in case of emergency, you can quickly put everything back into place.

6. Be uncompromising . If you really clean, then carefully - you should be aware of what is stored even in the most remote corners of the house.

7. Don't get nostalgic about old things and think about them for too long, otherwise your project will never end.

8. Don't stop cleaning halfway . Try to set aside time for this on a regular basis. Set small goals and achieve them. Reward yourself with something nice for each completed piece of work.

9. Once you've cleaned one area, don't clutter it up again. Maintain order.

10. Give everything you need "maneuvering room" . Each section after parsing should remain half empty. It is difficult to maintain orderliness on shelves and in drawers full of things. Give air to them and to yourself.

11. Motivate yourself when you are overtaken by regret about some things that seem to be unnecessary, but it is a pity to throw them away. Try not to give in. Imagine how good it is in a clean and comfortable home without clutter. Mom's motivation on maternity leave: how to become happy

12. Make a wish card . Hang on the wall images of interiors in which you would like to live. It is possible that after cleaning the situation in your home will come closer to ideal.

Getting rid of rubbish is the beginning of a new life stage. It will become easier for you, and you will begin to enjoy every day, where life is much easier.

What is trash?

Rubbish is all unnecessary things . There is obvious rubbish: a bicycle frame that has been living on your balcony for years; a dozen plastic bottles left just in case; TV box; old chargers; broken toys are all rubbish that you can part with without regret right now.

What seems to be necessary is much more complicated. Many things in a house with a child quickly become obsolete: the baby grows out of clothes and shoes, ceases to be interested in previous toys, begins to do without a stroller. It's the same with other things, which, although slower, but still become unusable or do not justify themselves. How do you know if you need a specific item?

You don't need the item if:

you don't like it;
tired;
you do not use it;
you have one or more of the same items.

It is especially difficult to say goodbye to items that you spent money on and now the purchases are lying around. In this case, you should properly “get angry” and remember about the interior of your dreams. Do you want to live in a beautiful house? Get rid of trash.

Dealing with clutter is great because it can be done with children. It is interesting for the child to consider things that the mother disassembles (just do not forget that the item must be safe). Yes, and you will not be bored with the transformation of the house. 40 ways to keep a child aged 3 to 6 years old or how to spend the holidays with benefit?

Not everything is worth throwing in the trash. What kind of things you can give a new life, and how to do it, read in the next article.

Dear mothers! Do you think it's time to say goodbye to unnecessary things, and do you plan to set aside time for this? Or maybe you have already established an exemplary order? Share with us your impressions of living in a renovated house and the experience of maintaining order in these conditions.

how to free up a home for living

Of course, you have heard of Marie Kondo, a Japanese woman who invented a method of cleaning and decluttering: she wrote the book "Magic Cleaning", which is popular all over the world. Her Chinese colleague went further: after completing projects, designer Lu Wei would ask to be allowed to visit her clients to see how they live and find out what her ideas turned out to be useful and what didn’t. Each time she was surprised to find a cluttered house. Even the interior, thought out to the smallest detail, could not withstand the onslaught of things.

It was then that she conceived a system that would allow her not to lose what she needed, but at the same time not to give half of the apartment for storage systems and not to force it with cabinets. Cyan.Journal was inspired by the rules and ideas from Lou Wei's book "A Home to Live" and learned how designers apply them in real life.

Rule 1: “put on a diet” house

According to the Agency for Housing Mortgage Lending, the area of an average city apartment in Russia is 54 square meters. m, in China - 80 sq. m. But due to the difference in population in Russia, there are 23 "squares" per person, and in China - only a little more than 28 square meters. m. Regardless of the area of the dwelling, up to a third of the apartment will have to be given for storage systems. True, this will not be a third of the area, but a third of the volume. In his book, Lu Wei calculates that the things of a family of three occupy an average of 10 cubic meters. m is about 300 suitcases for hand luggage.

For example, if the apartment has high ceilings, it is better to place wall cabinets for rarely used items under the ceiling. Or, on the contrary, raise the bed or other areas to the podium, inside which the built-in storage systems are hidden. Such furniture will not occupy additional floor space.

But the designer reminds us that we allow ourselves everything we want, except for the space to live. So, it’s not enough just to figure out where to store things. You will have to get rid of something so as not to turn an apartment for living into a warehouse. Therefore, you will have to “put the house on a diet” - throw out all the non-working, unnecessary, old, unpleasant things for you.

Rule #2: Think of everything as a container for things

Lou Wei calls any limited space a storage system. For example, an apartment is a very large container, inside of which there are cells-rooms, and in them there are smaller containers - cabinets and chests of drawers, inside which are the tiniest containers - boxes and boxes. If there are not enough containers for all things, nothing can be done about it.

Therefore, the designer offers an exercise - draw the layout of your apartment and highlight all the cabinets and containers with things with a colored marker. This will allow you to understand whether you have enough storage systems, and whether it will be possible to provide additional ones.

Rule No. 3: Each room has a closet

Sometimes it seems that the right solution would be a warehouse for storing all, all things of the family. But in practice, this is not convenient at all. Things should be at hand, otherwise, sooner or later, the owners will become too lazy to take them to their place, and they will again settle on all surfaces in the room. It is difficult to do in the bedroom without a closet or dressing room - it would be foolish to go to the living room or hallway for clothes every time. Similarly, do not place cabinets with dishes and products outside the kitchen and dining room.

Therefore, the colored storage systems from the previous rule should be evenly distributed throughout the apartment. Each room will need its own storage system, even a small one. For example, in the bathroom, it is necessary to provide a hanging cabinet with a mirrored facade or install shelves above the washing machine to store household chemicals and bath accessories.

If each room has its own place to store things, then the chances that the owners will put them away, because it will not require extra efforts.

Rule #4: Store 12% of the apartment

The total area of all storage systems must cover at least 12% of the area of the apartment. Lu Wei found an easy way to roughly estimate what this figure is. It is enough to cut out the painted elements from the plan and put them next to each other, close, on the plan of the apartment. It will become obvious whether there are many or few compared to the size of the dwelling.

Moreover, there is a strange paradox: the smaller the apartment, the greater the percentage will have to be allocated for storage. For example, for an apartment of 35–40 sq. m organized storage of things will take up to a third of the area.

True, in a small area, the approach will be different: suppose, in addition to a regular wardrobe, you can also use a bed with built-in drawers. Its area on the plan will be two to three times larger than that of the cabinet, and its capacity will be about the same.

Rule No. 5: sort and group things

Sometimes you can fit a lot more things in a small area if you organize the storage correctly. Lu Wei compares this to a one-story house and a skyscraper that sit on the same piece of land. It is obvious which one will have more residents. Likewise, walk-in closets and pantries hold more things than nightstands and closets combined. Even in the built-in wardrobe, which occupies the same area as a regular one, twice as many things are placed.

To keep the huge wall-to-wall closet from looking too massive, Lu Wei reveals a few life hacks. For example, smooth and light facades look lighter than dark ones with a panel.

A lot of handles also make the cabinet heavier, so it is better to use a latch stop instead of them - the doors will open when pressed. And to hide the volume of the cabinet, it can be built into a specially created niche or at least hang a mirror panel on its end.

Rule #6: hide 80% of things, leave 20% in plain sight

The more visual information a person perceives, the more cluttered the room seems to him. And the feeling of cleanliness arises if there are not too many objects, they are all pleasant, pleasing to the eye. Therefore, designer interiors usually look great, but after a week they lose their appeal due to a bunch of things everywhere.

Lu Wei empirically deduced the 80/20 rule: she makes 80% of storage systems closed - she hides most of the things behind doors and facades. The remaining 20% of open shelves and surfaces are dedicated to beautiful things and things that the owners use regularly, several times a day.

For example, a coffee table with built-in drawers will solve the storage problem in the living room. It is enough to put in them everything that usually settles on the countertop - the room will be visually cleaner. In the kitchen or bathroom, more things may remain in plain sight, because they are used too often, and it is pointless to put them in the closet. But the 80/20 ratio is still worth striving for.

Rule No. 7: Use the great power of uniformity

Li Wei organizes the storage of small things in the same way: the less visual information, the better. Therefore, instead of assorted boxes and boxes, the designer advises choosing the same containers and containers. It is enough to pour shampoos and shower gels into them in the bathroom, put shoes in a special locker consisting of identical containers, store children's toys in identical boxes, and food in the refrigerator in identical containers.

In order for the "trick" to succeed, the containers must be the same or at least from the same series, so Lu Wei recommends choosing famous brands that will be able to pick up the same containers in a few years.

It is good if the containers are rectangular (they fit a larger volume), multifunctional (from the refrigerator - immediately into the oven) and stackable (easy to put on top of each other). An attractive appearance is important.

It's great if the container has a transparent section so you don't have to guess its contents. But this issue is also solved with the help of signed labels.

Rule #8: Customize furniture

Standard furniture isn't perfect. Its problem is just in the standard, because it does not take into account the needs of the owner. Lu Wei notes that this option is usually chosen for reasons of economy when the budget is limited.

But after a month or a year things will no longer fit in a closet or chest of drawers, you have to buy another one. Therefore, sometimes it makes sense to immediately order a spacious wardrobe according to individual sizes, rather than buying several wardrobes and forcing them into an apartment.

The requirements for custom-made furniture can be very specific. For example, dressers for shoes are often set on 10 cm legs to fit casual shoes underneath. But she does not always have enough space. The problem would be solved by the same chest of drawers, but with two open shelves at the bottom. There would definitely fit the shoes that the family uses every day.

And in order to design any storage system for any need, it is better to make a detailed list of things for which you have to find a place.

The decluttered home

How to Declutter Your Home: 6 Best Room-by-Room Methods

Click Play to Learn How to Get Rid of Stuff With These Pain-Free Strategies

Creating a Decluttering Timeline

The Bathroom

The Bedroom

Closet and Clothing

The Entryway, Mudroom, and Foyer

The Kitchen

The Living Room