Coat Closet Upgrade

I am lucky enough to have a large coat closet in my house.  Until recently, it was the only room in the house I had not tackled (ignoring the whole first floor, natch). Trim and walls still covered in the world's cheapest paint, coat hooks everywhere, primer only on the ceiling, which I had partially scraped. A depressing little space, saved only by the fact that it had a lovely window in it.

*Before*

In September when my sister told me she'd be moving in, I realized that everything that I had been storing in the guest room needed to go somewhere else. Ack! There was only one shelf in the coat closet, with plenty of room for another above. I could have just thrown up another shelf and gotten on with my life, but it seemed this was the time to tackle the closet for real.

So with a budget of exactly zero dollars, I went about fixing it up.  Out came everything. I scrubbed and scraped and primed and took down the coat hooks. I measured and cut a new shelf from wood left over from the old pantry shelving.  To hold up the shelf, cleats taken down from the bedroom closets were a perfect fit and just needed a coat of new paint. 

*During*

new shelves and more storage space!

All the trim was painted to match the rest of the house using leftover paint.  Then the walls were painted with the color from the hallway, as I had  a lot of that left over and I love a darker color in small spaces.  It also went well with a blue painted wood cart that I planned to use in the closet.  The shelves were painted to match the cart as a fun accent.  I spray painted 3 of the hooks black and re-installed them on the back wall.  The final piece was hanging up the Ansel Adams print - an old calendar page - in a frame I had in the attic. I no longer cringe when getting my coat in the morning and now the closet finally looks like it belongs in my house!

*After*

So glad to say goodbye to this!