The ultimate spring clean: how to declutter the home

Spring has sprung and it’s that time of year again; we’re heading into summer and the promise of long days and sunshine. Here’s the top five tips to declutter the home in time for summer from Innovative Interiors.

The allure of living a simple life free of excess ‘things’ is a powerful one for many of us. All too often we find ourselves living amongst the consequence of excess consumption - amidst piles of inane items or those that are no longer of use. Even when we limit the amount of possessions we own, if those possessions aren’t organised, the home can still feel chaotic. 

“That’s why organisation and decluttering is so important,” Innovative Interiors’ Marie Robinson says. “If you can cleverly organise your possessions in a way where you know where everything is and the items used frequently or daily are easy to access, life instantly becomes that little bit simpler.”

1. Start Small 
Decluttering and organising the home doesn’t have to be an ‘all-in’ upheaval of your current lifestyle. Rather, it can be a commitment to slowly achieving the goals for your home, room by room, item by item. “Often, setting yourself an achievable goal is a good place to start. For example, donating old clothes to charity or getting rid of unwanted or broken kitchen appliances. Similarly, some people find committing to removing one item a day from the home is a reasonable and achievable challenge. It’s about finding what works for you and holding yourself accountable to that goal.’
 

2. Begin in the Bedroom

The bedroom is arguably the best place to begin the process of organising the home. To declutter the bedroom allows for the creation of a calm, tranquil space that naturally flows through to the other areas of the house.

3. Invest in a Wardrobe Organiser or Custom Solution

Too often, the bedroom wardrobe is a place where clothes and accessories are hurridley placed behind closed doors without much thought. The wardrobe quickly becomes a storage area devoid of organisation where the clothes or accessories used most recently stay in the area easiest to access while the others remain unseen and therefore forgotten or unused. 
“Wardrobes are often the area of the house in most need of attention, simply because the existing wardrobe storage solutions are not fit for purpose or were not designed with the needs of the current occupants in mind,” Marie says.

“When we work with customers to organise their homes, we take time to understand their needs, their possessions and what their ideal space would look like. From there, we work to maximise the space and ensure ‘dead’ areas such as the back corners of wardrobes are utilised with solutions such as spin robes that make access to these areas easy, or pull-out mirrors, shelves or drawers. In a child’s room, we would generally look at how easy it is for the child to access areas of shelving or hanging areas and work with a view to creating an organised space that allows for both ease of use and simple organisation.”

4. Decluttering the Garage: How to Organise Storage

Like the bedroom, the garage is another area of the home where items are often used and hurriedly put away, with those that aren’t easy to access or visible overlooked. “A custom storage solution in the garage allows for the space to be transformed. When you can see and access what you need, a garage becomes a joy to use,” Marie says.

Before considering a storage solution in the garage, a good place to start is taking out everything currently stored in cupboards and drawers and on any shelving and line it all up in one area, Marie says. “Look at what you own and decide what is useful and what is superfluous. From there, it will become clear what size and type of storage is needed to allow access to the items you own and use.”

Then, Marie says, it’s about looking at the space. What could be improved? What clever solutions would work best for the occupants? How do they use the garage, and what are the likely future uses? “When garage storage is carefully considered, even in the smallest spaces, the transformation is significant.”

5. Organising the Home Office

The home office is another room where decluttering and organisation can make a huge difference to the functioning of the area. With a clean, organised and clutter-free workspace much more can be achieved, Marie says. “Like the kitchen and bedroom, the office is typically an area of a home that needs attention. In many cases, the home office doubles as a storage room or a place for those odds and ends that don’t quite fit anywhere else.

“If that is the case, clever dynamic storage systems will help to easily declutter and organise the space. Perhaps the home office requires overhead cupboards and file storage as well as systems to place those occasional use items such as spare linen or children’s toys. Like any room, it’s always best to take everything out, consider what is current and useful and what isn’t. Then, donate or get rid of the items that aren’t and with only the items that will remain, the storage can be designed to create a clutter-free room where everything is easy to access.”

Innovative Interiors specialises in home organisation and offers a complete design service along with custom-designed and bespoke solutions. Make sure you visit Innovative Interiors on ArchiPro here to find out more.