Closet hunting at IKEA

If a hurricane blew through your closet and left your clothes in heaps, would you:
A) not notice?
B) move things into neater heaps each time you got dressed?
C) rally all your strength to put everything back in its proper place?
D) fall on the floor because without the sense of order that your closet imposes on your life, you are utterly useless?

I vacillate between B and A and D (B-A-D). I can’t choose C because my clothes rack is currently unstable and will fall if I put clothes back on it. Long story short: we bought a condo in a work/live artists’ building, not a luxury loft building where I’m sure all the built-in fixtures not only will not fall down, but will also be quite stylish. We consider ourselves lucky to live here, but at the closing, they might as well have given us a list of items that we would have to fix.

And it’s not just my closet. About six months ago, a neighbor reported that his clothes rack had fallen down in the middle of the night. Although he’s in a heavy metal country band and probably has a few Elvis-type costumes in his closet, I don’t think the weight of our clothes is the issue. It’s also happening in my husband’s closet. The wire shelf has started its slow leaning away from the wall. If I took a poll this weekend at the condo meeting, I’d probably hear of more cases.

My husband was for a quick fix because overnight guests were coming who would want a house tour and if they saw our clothes-strewn bedroom, they might call one of those makeover shows, and we’d have to smile and pretend we were not humiliated when a crew and cameras came knocking. But I prevailed.

I found a wardrobe storage system that I liked at IKEA called Antonius, although what really hooked me was the flash-based video, which fast-forwarded through five or so installation scenarios. I paused and restarted the video over and over to see exactly how the system was assembled. IKEA's storage solutions seem to take ten seconds to install in any room you might want. A cunningly easy, and deceptive, invitation to picture my clothes on those shelves and those racks.

On Columbus Day, my husband and I pulled up to the big blue box (with yellow accents) that is IKEA -- in Stoughton, MA. At the top of the escalator on the display floor, we spot the perfect wardrobe storage system called Pax. A sign that this quest would be easy, fast, efficient? We oohed and awed, touched the wood shelves and pullout hanging racks, and took pictures with our iPhones.

The fact that we had a single purpose made it easier to combat big building fatigue syndrome, which involves yawning and loss of energy and a growing claustrophobia. People everywhere. IKEA-world. A peak into an organized future of immaculate closets, and then a plunge into the depths of overwhelming tiredness at finding yourself and tons of strangers milling around coveting lifestyle improvements that we could or could not or could partially afford, manifesting itself in the desire to eat, which became unbearable by the time we hit the strategically placed cafeteria with its legendary Swedish meatballs (a pass for me) and the slightly better than second-rate salmon and veggie plate (my husband’s choice) or the safe Greek salad (my pick).

My pear soda refreshes me. Me: “So, are we going to buy these frames?” Husband: “No. I’m going to make them.” Me: “But are you going to make all those different drawers and shelves and hanger thingies?” Husband: “No. We’re going to buy those.” My husband who is a hybrid of contractor and architect has since sketched on computer the exact configuration of components to fit into his closet.



I remain eternally grateful that I married a man who is handy. Otherwise I would have had to hire someone to customize the IKEA system (their “boxes” are too tall for our closets). Or I would’ve had to hire the California Closet people, which my husband says could cost $4,000. We’re hoping to spend $900 per closet, excluding the cost of our (mostly his) labor.