Dream scenario: to have a master bedroom closet that is a walk-in closet in which both Daniel and I can put away clothes, look through our clothes, get dressed and check ourselves out in a full-length mirror without bumping into each other and even throw clothes down on a chaise longue that is there simply to look good while under a pile of clothes that we were too lazy to put away.

Reality: not that.

Truth is, we don’t need all of that space and I don’t think either one of us can imagine living in a house big enough to have that kind of master bedroom closet. Daniel has good style and likes clothes, but he hates shopping so it’s not like he has a ton of stuff that needs to go in a closet. I am the opposite in that I love clothes and shoes (I mean, I even started a clothing line), and love to shop. BUT, I am really good at cleaning house. I have lived in 11 apartments and houses in four states since graduating college so I’ve gotten really good at not hoarding or having more than I need.

Good thing, because we had to consolidate everything into one dresser and the 112″ of space we had left in our master bedroom after the renovation to create a closet.

Truth is, part two, that we actually did the master closet last November. We went 11 months of living in the house without a closet in our room and finally getting one was a huge deal. We did it kind of rushed when we found out that family was going to spend time with us over the holidays and we needed to clean out the guest room for them. I did a very quick analysis on what it would take either for us to build our own closet, for a local carpenter to come in and make one for us, or for us to go with a well-known closet-making company, even if it could be expensive. We decided that, for the amount of time we had and wanting to go with a trusted source, we went with California Closets.

As this isn’t an ad for them, I won’t go into all the details, but I’ll say it was an easy process and, because we weren’t doing anything difficult, they were able to build us a custom closet within a few weeks of our initial meeting. As you can see, we got a closet with several hanging sections and several areas to put folded clothes. Because most of Daniel’s clothes are folded and his clothes take up almost the entire dresser, most of the closet is for me.

One thing to note: access to the attic/crawl space is in this area so California Closets designed a space that would allow someone with a ladder to get up there. It just so happens that that area makes a nice shelf for my jewelry and body products. I appreciate that this is there so I don’t have to clutter the dresser or bathroom with those items.

Something else to note that is quite obvious: there are no closet doors. The reason for that is really quite annoying. Closets need a depth of at least 24″ to give enough space for the width of hanging clothes. This area does not have quite that depth and, in fact, the depth of the closet all the way to the left near the window is deeper than the width to the right closer to the bedroom door. Creating  a custom door situation will be really expensive and we didn’t have that in the budget last year when we had the closet installed, nor have we had that budget this year. We are looking into creative solutions – read, DIY, I hope – next year so we can finally have the master bedroom (almost) finished.

So what do you think of our master bedroom closet and our use of the space? More importantly, what do you think of my jar of bangles?!