It took me years to realise that I am most productive when I am most organised; time-wise, thoughts-wise and things-wise.
So, I aim to reach my 30th birthday next year with an organised schedule, mind and home. I will document bits and pieces of organisation ideas and tips being implemented in my life on this blog. I shall call this adventure organise-my-life project. Hopefully I will meet my deadline with a completed work.
This brings us to one aspect of organisation that has boggled my brain for a while now; chest of drawers for clothes, how do I organise them and make them stay that way forever. I yank a t-shirt out and the whole system disintegrates. Or I try again and lift the whole stack of tops and take the one I want and I end up doing that once and decide the next time that I just want the top t-shirt and leave the rest never to be worn again. And go back to the yanking method and back to my dilemma.
Just like Sheldon, I’ve been using a FlipFold for a few years (I made one with cardboard before forking out the money to buy a real one) but it doesn’t solve the stacking problem.
I thought of a filing system, which actually has been done through an IKEA hack – T-shirt filing HEMNES drawerbut I’m not that handy and the comments made a point on space (which I am trying to maximise).
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| At a glance, these look like a lady's monthly necessities |
I remember an organising tip retrieved from an obscure part of my mind; think vertical. So I did more research (read: Googling). I found these beauties called Pliio. I think they’re an absolutely brilliant idea. Unfortunately, they do not have a retailer in Australia. A check with Amazon showed that they are USD20 for ten and they will deliver for about USD20. Now, my tops probably cost me about $10 each so I doubt I would spend $5 just to put them away. Besides, I needed them to fit nicely in my drawers.
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| What the inside of my drawer looks like now |
So, taking my cue from my experiment with the FlipFold apparatus, I decided to try this filing system with, you guessed it, cardboard! They were from IKEA and toy boxes mostly.
My drawers are about 350mm deep and 150mm high. So for the main body, I measured out 150 x 130 mm so I could have two rows and have some leeway for clothes thickness. The Pliio has three sections to it. I copied that design and found it perfect for dresses and long tunics but not so perfect for regular tops.
So for t-shirts, I measured out a main body and just one flap. As for pants, I find just having the main body is enough.
Materials:
Cardboard
Pencil/pen
Ruler
Scissors/box cutter
Tape measure
1. Measure your space.
2. Decide on the size of the main body of the clothes filer and how many flaps. Mark on cardboard.
3. Cut the cardboard and use it as prototype for tens/hundreds more you have to cut.
4. Tend to your sore scissors hand.
How to fold:
Top - flatten shirt and place filer in the middle, fold on either side, then fold top and bottom and fold the filer.
Pants - fold pants lengthways, put filer on one end, fold either sides and fold from the filer end until done.
And here's how to fold a child's top:
Tips:
Make sure your source of cardboard is clean
Make sure your source of cardboard is clean
The corrugated nature of cardboard makes it easy to manipulate when folding a thick article of clothing
I would love to come up with something that doesn't require to be left in the garments or even just a better and more durable material. But in the meantime, I am happy with this solution.
Edit: I have since ditched the cardboard because I find it easier to just 'eye' the folding. I still fold my clothes the same way for the drawers minus the cardboard (14/08/15)
