You have a lot of shoes but little space to put them. The floor of your closet is covered with heels and flats and sneakers, and as you slog through your shoe collection to find the right pair for the night out, you reach an epiphany. You could get a handy-dandy storage device to keep your shoes organized.
You don’t have to break the bank to get one — take a look at these ideas.
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Shoe Rack
Shoe racks are the main organization method people go to organize their shoes easily. They’re low to the ground and perfect for the lazy — you can place where to set your shoes on the rack with your feet, avoiding bending down to move the shoes. You can put a shoe rack by the door of where you usually enter your home for convenience.
The downside to shoe racks, however, is that they’re often limited in size. The most a shoe rack could hold would be about ten pairs of shoes. If you try to put more shoes on a standard shoe rack, it will look cluttered and messy. Doing so would also make finding a pair of shoes more difficult.
Therefore, shoe racks are excellent for shoe storage for those who don’t have large shoe collections. For those who do, you’ll have to find another option, such as the ones below.
Check out different types of shoe racks here.
Cabinet
If you want to create a shoe storage cabinet, you’ll have to convert a standard cabinet into a shoe storing masterpiece.
You can convert any cabinet into a shoe rack, though you’ll want to be practical in its location. By the front door or in your bedroom closet would be the best, but you could also place the shoe cabinet in the living room of your house, though it could be an eyesore for guests.
Determine where best to put the shoe cabinet, as it’s unlikely you’ll move the cabinet until it’s time to move out.
Once you’ve purchased and placed the cabinet in your living space, you can remove the walls of the sliding boxes so that the flat rolling platform is left. Or, if you want to keep your shoes from scraping against the edges of the cabinet as you pull them in and out, enjoy the box walls. It saves time not to do anything anyway.
After that, put your shoes in the cabinet. You can organize based on heels, flats, dress shoes, and more depending on how many cabinet boxes you have. If you run out of space, you can easily add more storage by putting another cabinet next to the one you already bought.
Cabinets are a simple, available option for shoe storage. Feel free to decorate the cabinet as well, such as painting it a complementary color to the room it’s in. If you want out of sight storage while keeping your shoes in one place, a cabinet is an excellent option.
Besides, since the cabinet is closed, you can contain any shoe smells you might be self-conscious of. We know that wearing your favorite shoes after so many years mean they can get ripe, so storing them in an enclosed cabinet prevents your shoe smell from bleeding into the surrounding rooms.
Wooden Boxes
Cabinets are functional and discrete shoe storage devices, but perhaps you want something more aesthetically pleasing. Wooden box shelves act as an easy DIY project to coordinate your shoes without getting expensive.
If you want to be extra proud of your DIY creation, you can make the wooden boxes at home with some scrap wood from another home project you had or purchased from a home-improvement store. Otherwise, you can buy wooden boxes from craft stores or from places like Home Depot or Lowe’s.
The boxes you make or create look fine on their own but can be a bit too barebones for some people’s tastes. Add a layer of paint to make the wooden boxes really stand out.
Once prepared, attach the bottom of the boxes to the walls like a shelf. You can then stack your shoes in the boxes based on the type, color, age, or whatever other labels you prefer.
The wooden boxes are stylish enough to add a flair to any closet or foyer but functional enough to hold all your shoes. Besides, as mentioned, installing wooden boxes on your walls is simple to do.
If you rent your space and don’t want to damage your wall, you can only add a few screws to keep the boxes in place, as described in this video. Depending on how many shoes you want to put on your shelves, you might want to consider adding more screws, though.
The wooden boxes add a vintage flair to your apartment while holding all your shoes. They’re simple to do an easy way to manage your shoe collection.
Under the Bed Shoe Trolly
Perhaps you don’t have that many shoes to warrant a cabinet but enough to take up too much space when aligned along the floor of your closet. Or maybe you don’t have that much space in your room and want to maximize the amount of surface area you can scrape together.
In that case, a rolling storage bin under your bed will be the simplest and most space-effective option for you.
If you have access to power tools, you can make your own rolling storage bin following this tutorial. You’ll have to create the box within which to put the shoes, precisely add the wheels, and add a handle for easier maneuvering.
But if you don’t have access to power tools or wood, or you don’t want to spend the time making a drawer, you can purchase a rolling drawer to go under your bed online.
There are various storage options that can go under your bed. You can opt for a rolling drawer like the one described in the video — one that doesn’t have a top on it so your shoes will be the first thing you see when you pull it out.
Or you can have an enclosed box that itself stays stationary, but you pull the drawer out of it, like a single shelf cabinet. This choice would be best if you want to keep your shoes private, such as if you’re afraid of the smell or if you don’t want people judging the number of shoes you have.
Storage bins that go under the bed allow you to free up closet space and keep your shoes collected. If you don’t have a closet, even better — you have a place to store your shoes at all.
Since your bed already takes up space in your room, use the dead space underneath it to your advantage with a rolling drawer for your shoes. You’ll be getting dressed in your room anyway, so you can complete your outfit before even walking out of your bedroom door.
Bins Under the Bed
If you don’t want to go through the trouble of getting a long drawer or want to break up space under your bed for other items. In that case, you can use regular bins to hold your shoes and pull them out when you want to retrieve a pair.
You can buy mesh or wicker storage bins from any craft store or find some at a thrift store. If you’re worried about sanitation, you can staple or sew fabric inside the box and replace it whenever it’s necessary.
Bins are storage options you can add to underneath your bed with a simple trip into town to buy the bins. Bins are so accessible that you probably won’t have to go online to buy them. However, if you’re particular with the type of bin you want — perhaps striving to keep up with the visual style of your room, patrolling the internet will be your best bet.
You can keep a row of bins along the edge of the underside of your bed to keep your shoes organized. Bins under the bed would be best if you have a maximum of twelve shoes, but you might need more robust options if you have a higher amount of shoes.
Shoe Storage Ottoman
Another hidden option to store your copious shoes is within an ottoman. Ottoman’s are footrests that you commonly see in someone’s study or living room, so they’ll never expect to be placing their feet on a cushioned box filled with shoes.
Again, ottomans allow you to use underutilized space in your house since ottomans are rarely empty in the middle and even more rarely have storage devices in them.
You can purchase ottomans with shoe storage pouches in them from major retail stores. Or, if you have the drive to do it yourself, you can empty out a regular ottoman and add the pouches yourself.
Storing your shoes in your ottoman lets you put shoes in unlikely spaces, freeing up the rest of the area for other items. They’ll be out of sight if you want to store your off-season shoes elsewhere in your house or apartment.
Be sure to remember where you store your shoes, though, as not many people think to check their ottoman for their rainboots.
Hanging Closet Storage
These organizers hang on the rail in your closet, like the ones that clothes hangers perch on. You can add five or six vertical shelves that give you plenty of space to hold your shoes in your closet.
However, while convenient, the hanging closet organizers could impede the area in which you could hang your clothes. If you have a lot of blouses and jackets, you might not want to give up that precious space to hold your shoes since there are other options in which to organize your shoes.
But if you have drawers to hold your clothes or don’t have that many clothes to begin with, hanging closet shelves are an efficient and space-effective way to keep track of your numerous pairs of shoes.
Walk-In Closet Shelves
A way to add organizational flair into your closet — no matter the size, is to add shelves.
Floating shelves would be the most aesthetically pleasing option, but they don’t give you flexibility in the amount of space they take up. If you plan on downsizing your shoe collections, you could be left with useless empty shelves taking up space in your closet.
If you can’t bore into your walls or don’t have the tools to do so, you can buy portable shelving units from retail stores. College students tend to use them in their dorms, and you can buy some shelves to create more surface area and store your shoes with ease.
Bookshelf
Bookshelves are an often overlooked yet effective way to store your shoes. Firstly, they’re easily available from most stores, and you can buy some shelves at a reduced price from a second-hand store.
A large walk-in closet will be spacious enough to accommodate a bookshelf. With it, you can organize your shoes based on color, style, type, and so forth. If you’re limited on space or can’t fit a tall bookshelf, hip-length bookshelves would be sufficient enough to store your shoes without taking up too much space.
Over The Door Shoe Organizers
A common and easily accessible option is to purchase a hanging closet storage device that can hold a variety of items but especially shoes.
You can buy the hanging storage organizers online or in most retail stores — especially if the back-to-school season is on its way. Many college students use hanging closet storage to maximize their living space, so you can typically find sales for these organizers or get them cheap with special deals.
Organizers that hang over the door don’t interfere with your closet space since they don’t hang on the rail that your clothes hanger rely on. The back of your door isn’t used for anything except for the occasional poster, so again use this creative and useful organizer to your advantage to never lose a pair of shoes again.
Shoe Pegs
Low-hanging shoe pegs let you keep your shoes next to each other while freeing up floor space. There will always be a place to store a pair of shoes.
The problem with shoe pegs, though, is that they can take up more space than what they’re worth. It would take a lot of shoe pegs to organize a medium to large shoe collection, and storing shoes vertically/diagonally, as they would be held on a shoe peg, would occupy more space than necessary.
Laying shoes flat on the soles can be more easily accommodated than hung up by the back of the shoe. If you have lots of space in your hoes that you’d like to use, shoe pegs would be worth your while. Otherwise, another shoe organization method would be more suited for you.
Mesh Rack
A mesh, metal rack won’t get dirty with use from the bottom of your shoe. You can continue to store your shoes on it without having to take it out or wash it. They’re lightweight and easy to move, and they provide a sleek look to the room that holds it.
Metal Grid for Heels
A mesh rack acts like large shelves to lay your shoes flat on. A metal grid, though, lets you hang your heels up by the horizontal rods. You can keep your heels together by color and pluck them off the grid when you want to wear them. Once done, you can replace the heels on the grid.
This option not only looks mature and up-scale but lets you avoid touching the bottom of your shoes if you don’t want to get your hands dirty. A metal grid for shoes is a simple arrangement to keep a pair of shoes together.
Circular Shoe Carousel
Some kitchens have a rotating spice rack, allowing you to spin the shelves until you find what you need. Why not have the same premise for your shoe rack?
You can make a spinning shoe rack from home, but you can also buy one online if you can’t. They’re an excellent way to cram lots of shoes in as little space as possible. Their only downside, though, would be if you get motion sick easily you could get dizzy trying to find your shoes in a hurry.
And since you don’t have your shoes in front of you, you could find it harder to find the pair that you need. You’ll keep spinning and spinning the rack until you finally manage to spot the pair. Still, if you want an economical and space-saving solution to your massive shoe collection, a spinning shoe carousel would be your best bet.
Everyone in society needs a pair of shoes, but finding a place to store them can be a pain. Especially if you have a lot of shoes, you might be scratching your head wondering how logically to keep your shoes organized. The above options would be best for you, as they’re cheap, easy ideas for effective shoe storage.