After we finished up phase 1 of our side entrance makeover (check out the before, painting, artwork, and lighting), and it was looking all pretty…
…until we carried on down the stairs to tackle sore spot #2. The bottom of the stairs storage nook.
When you walk down the stairs to our basement, you come through a first door which takes you into a vestibule with the storage area and the laundry closet. Then you can carry through another door which takes you into the 1-bedroom apartment in our basement. So that’s like our tenant’s “front door”.
We always felt reeeeally badly that this storage area had gotten out of control. When we finished up our insane 7-week basement reno back in 2010, we just plunked some old shelving and drawer units down in that storage area and left is as-is. Ever since, it has just continued to accumulate more and more stuff and look more and more cray-cray. I’m embarrassed to even show you these pics.
It’s a total mish mash of stuff in here. Stuff that we need to access fairly regularly, stuff that can’t go into our garage (like paint – it would freeze!), and just random junk. Our tenant also uses this spot for her shoes, recycling, and some other supplies.
I did a bit of searching around to check out storage solutions, and am really digging the look of the IKEA Algot series. It’s a modular system with tons of different options (drawers, shelves, etc) and I like that it’s mounted directly onto the wall. No big bulky units sitting on the floor.
Here are a few pics in my inspiration folder (all three images from ikea.com)
Before we can get to the fun part though, we need to actually clear out and sort our stuff. Is it weird that I’m excited to do that? Purge, purge, purge!
Are you guys tackling the organization/storage in your pad? Ever used the Algot system from IKEA? I’m not sure if it’s the new year, the cold winter weather, or what, but I seem to just be moving from one spot to the next in our house trying to organize everything – it all needs to have a dedicated home!