easy diy closet organizers??

[MommyDOK]

does anyone have any experience w/ closetmaid?? Elfa??

Is there a brand you did yourself that worked? We cannot afford the places that come in and do it for you, so will have to measure and do it ourselves. HOw long does it take?? Any warnings??

All input is appreciated.

[simonsmama]

I don't have any personal experience, but I've heard alot of good things about closetmaid.

[LZP]

Oh, Ii wish I had a photo of ours here at work- we LOVE our new closet. We built ourselves from a section of our bedroom, and then used organizers from Easy Closets. You measure yourself, then design it online with their software. Before you order, a specialist calls you to go over everything and make sure that you have the correct measurements, talk to you about the options you added, give pointers, and stress that you can call cust svc any time.

Looks like Closet Maid stuff, but WAY better quality. The customer service was fantastic!! It's a little pricey (I think about 10-15% more than Elfa from Container store maybe) but again, better quality than anything you'll get from Home Depot or another big box store.

We started with a pretty big walk-in space with LOTS of shelves and a few drawers so it took 2 days to install. A "regular" reach in closet wouldnt take more than 3/4 of a day at most I'd assume.

Tips- read the directions! (this goes for any of those solid looking systems) read them several times, so you're not referring to the details before every screw you put in the wall.

Use a good 4 foot or bigger level for the track on the wall. totally necessary.

Have patience.

get help if you have to carry boxes upstairs. We scheduled our delivery for a Friday, and when UPS came with 24 boxes- well... it was insane!

we actually left space to slide our dressers into sections under some shelves- looks awesome, and saves a ton of space in our bedroom (we have IKEA Malm dressers in the 3 drawer- perfect for the things that cant just sit out on a shelf, and way cheaper than adding those expensive closet system drawers.) so, I guess that's another tip- you could slide in simple dressers instead of paying a ton for drawers with the systems.

sorry, I get really excited when I talk about this project- it's one of our real accomplishments. Dare I say, a closet changed our life. we actually dont mind putting away mountains of clean laundry now!

ETA: as a reference- we had Closets by Design and California Closets come in and give us an estimate (and so we could use their ideas- after all, they're the experts with space planning!) each company came in around $3000 for our project, then with "discounts" came to maybe $2500 including install. We got our whole thing done, including buying some new wooden hangers for DH for about $950. again, this was a pretty BIG space IMO- 4 walls of stuff, 11x9 room. your experience may vary

[Katie T]

I have a one of those systems and it was super easy to put together and I love it! It is just partical board but works great for us. I will find the thread that has the before and after pics.

http://www.mothering.com/discussions....php?t=1209432

[elsie]

Done them all.

I like Elfa, but will only buy it during the sale. I have also done closet maid and easy track. The main thing is to make sure you have a level and the skill to put in a wall anchor in the right spot. Once you hang up the support track, everything else just falls into place. I did a huge closet for my mom in a few hours. Most of the systems are essentially the same. The nice thing about Elfa is that the Container store people make up a list of things you need to buy and you can always return stuff you don't use. They had us buy extra screws which were nice to have around and good to return.

[MommyDOK]

Originally Posted by elsie

Done them all.

I like Elfa, but will only buy it during the sale. I have also done closet maid and easy track. .

The sale is not until january....so do you think that closetmaid is sufficient??

[bigteamug]

I think you'll do fine with the Closetmaid. I have heard that the Elfa directions are awful, but haven't used them myself.

I also looked at some Elfa in my parents' pantry, and the part of the basket that hooked into the track was a rather flimsy plastic. I'm guessing that the quality varies from piece to piece within brands.

[Ygle]

We did all closet maid and I can't imagine needing better quality. Maybe some might have greater versatility or more help, but I never think to myself, wow this stuff is poorly made and we definitely use and abuse it. I did closet maid because it was easily available and I have a hard time committing so I like being able to just go the store and immediately get different pieces. One thing that really irritated me was that there seemed to be no standard on spacings, so the various accessories require different spacings, and they are odd numbers, like 23.75". We ended up taking most of our accessories back for that reason, not sure if the more expensive brands have better standardization. For that reason, if I want to have a drawer I just get a drawer and put it on a shelf rather than hang one on the rails (although you can get hardware to hang regular drawer systems as well, it just seemed easier to set in on a shelf for me). I do have one set of drawers and I manage to knock one loose all the time.

I love the versatility... we are constantly rearranging them as our needs change. It all went up very quickly and was extremely easy to use. We did have one issue that we resolved with washers, but now I can't remember what exactly that was?

[elsie]

Originally Posted by MommyDOK

The sale is not until january....so do you think that closetmaid is sufficient??

I actually do. The closetmaid stuff is very similar. The main difference is that it can be more confusing to figure out exactly which pieces you will need and you would have to cut down pieces if they are too big (Container store does this for you with Elfa). Other than that, it is a piece of cake. If you are looking at a standard configuration it will be a lot easier than something that is very custom.