Chrissy Halton, owner of Innerspace Interior Design

This week guest blogger and friend of STORE Chrissy Halton gives her top tips on banishing clutter and maximising your storage space:

Before starting on any new restyle or redecoration you need to look at what you already have, and decide on what you want to keep, and what can be re-housed.

 Decluttering a room can transform it – and possibly saves the need for complete redecoration as it gives the whole space a new lease of life. Your decoration and accessories can get lost amongst the clutter collected in everyday life very easily. People constantly strive for the modern, show home look so that they can have friends round and feel proud of their home – but it is often easy to forget that show homes are NOT real life – they do not have to have all the items that we all collect during our lives cluttering up the place, and they can be seen to be more spacious and thus more enticing.

In recent years the term “decluttering” has a very bad press, and is thought only to refer to those houses that you can barely walk around for the mess. In actual fact we all have clutter in our homes, it’s a fact of life! Clutter is simply anything that is not needed or loved in your home, or something that is not in its correct home. Therefore the only thing we need to be wary of is keeping it under control, and that can make all the difference in a design scheme, and will make or break it. You can have the most beautiful home, but if it has clutter (to whatever level) it will never feel as comfortable and relaxing and finished as you would like.

There are many reasons why we have clutter in our houses – life is busy and it is inevitable that some amount of clutter will build up. But it should be noted that it can make people depressed and unable to relax in their own home. They may feel overwhelmed at the task of sorting everything out, and many just start to ignore it. However, if it’s kept under control it is easier to create a beautiful and relaxing home.

 But the question is – where do you start?

First things first – prepare! Have a variety of storage boxes, bin liners and containers to hand, along with sticky labels, marker pens etc. This will make your life easier as you go through your home.

Start with one room/area at a time. For every item you find, ask yourself whether you want to keep it or get rid of it.

If you want to get rid of it, is it rubbish/recycling or could it be given to charity/family/friends? – have a box for each, and start to fill them!

If you want to keep it, ask yourself whether it is in the right room /area and whether it is useful or beautiful. Keeping items grouped together will help you have a more organised home (wrapping paper and cards stored with pens and sticky tape for example will make life easier when you come to someones birthday!). If an item is beautiful – where can you show it off to its best advantage (this will help you when you are restyling a room – you will know exactly what you have and where you want it to be seen – always a good starting point).

 Other handy hints for de-cluttering and organising your home are as follows:-

Keep wardrobes and rooms more organised by rotating with the seasons. Pack away items that are out of the current season (i.e. in summer you won’t need jumpers and coats, and your home will look fresher without the heavy curtains and throws you bought in the winter). When the next season comes around, pack away what you don’t need and get out of storage what you do. This is a great way of restyling your home easily, as most people have so much in their homes that you can’t put it all on display easily. By splitting up into seasons you can appreciate all your accessories at different times of the year, and create a refreshing change at the same time!

Take one area at a time – you will then start to see a real difference rather than if you jump from place to place.

For a family why not have colour coordinated storage boxes in the hallway – then anything that needs to be done/moved can be put into that persons box rather than put in piles that create a cluttered look in even the tidiest of houses (this can be done with post, toys, school bags, shoes and much more). This can create a very stylish and practical storage solution.

 So by now you will have thrown away, recycled, given away and packed away – and you will be left only with those things you need and those that you really love. At this point you will have a much better view of your home, and the space each room has. Now is the perfect time to assess the space and create the room design that you want. You won’t have to work around items that you don’t want to keep, and you can really see what you have to work with. You can now start accessorising your home and creating that all important new look.  

 Get rid of the clutter, create space, and get that beautiful home!

This guest blog was written by friend of STORE Chrissy Halton who is owner of the Innerspace Home Organisation Company and a professional declutterer. Chrissy works across the North West assisting clients with interior styling for both living in and selling their proprety as well as home organisation and decluttering.