storage

Hangups over the door

hangups

Hangup in the entrance hallway. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2016

We always need hangups, that is, somewhere to hang stuff, don’t we? When you have limited space for hanging things, use your doors where it is possible.

I have a very small entrance hallway. Except for the entrance door it has one door to my storage room. On that door I use an over-the-door hang up thing for jackets and bags and such that I use frequently. Also my guests hang their coats and such on this hanger as there is no space for anything else for this. This particular one I bought at Lagerhaus long ago. I like its colorful heads. No longer sold, but there are similar ones around.

hangups

Hang ups over the door. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2016

On that very same door I use both sides for hanging things. On its inside I have two small over-the-door hangers.

hangups

Hang ups over the door. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2016

Both hangers are used for bags for recycling purposes. They hang on the inside of the door to my storage room so you don’t see them unless you open the door. The one to the left is used for bulbs and batteries, the one to the right for plastic bottles to be returned to the store after use. A plastic bag with various paint brushes alos hangs there at the moment. It is always hard to find space for all that recycling one does nowadays. Hang them on hooks over the door works when content isn’t heavy.

hangups

Hang up on the bathroom door. Photo. ©nini.tjader.2016

I also use the door to the bathroom for over-the-door hangers. Here I only use the inside of the door, in the bathroom. There isn’t really anywhere in the bathroom to hang things, except for one single hook on the wall and smallish hooks for towels and then the towel-dryer. I need somewhere to hang my bathrobes and some other clothes. One of Ikeas over-the-door hangers solved that. When I bought it they only sold them in grayish metal. Nowadays you can also get them in white.

hangups

Over-the-door hangers. Photo. ©nini.tjader.2016

Except for the entrance door, I only have three doors inside the flat (not counting the sliding doors to the bedroom or the door to the patio). I only use two of them for over-the-door hangups, the one to the bathroom and both sides of the door to the storage room. I could use the inside of the door to the walk-in-closet, but presently have no need for it. Nowadays you can even find mirrors done for hanging over the door.

So, when there is no other solution for hanging things, use your doors.

Posted by nini in bathroom, hallway, Interior Design, ordermaking, Various, 0 comments

Little boxes on the wall

boxes, storage, bedroom

For some time now, little boxes have been very popular to hang on walls to solve various storage needs.

boxes, storage, bedroom

One of the bedside boxes. Photo. ©nini.tjader.2016

I have had mine, in the bedroom, for a couple of years by now. My problem was that I couldn’t find a bedside table small enough to put there. Space is limited and bedside tables were usually too big. These two boxes are prefect for my needs.

boxes, storage, bedroom

One of my bedside boxes. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2016

Thes two I bought from Ellos for a reasonable price some years ago. They are no longer sold, but you can find similar ones in several places. They can be hung either horizontally like here, or vertically if you prefer that.

boxes, storage, bedroom

My bedside boxes. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2016

In addition to the little boxes Iv put a picture ledge, slightly longer than the width of the bed and the bedframe above. I use it for pictures and decorative items, but of course you can use it for storage too if you like.

boxes, storage, wallstorage

Little boxes from Svenssons i Lammhult . Image from their website, slightly cropped.

The above little boxes are from Svensson i Lammhult, and expensive. Attached to each other, or not. For more examples and prices visit their website. If you don’t want to pay ridiculously high prices, IKEA has alternatives as well, the VALJE series for instance. As do most furniture stores presently. With or without doors. With or without backsides towards the wall.

Does a simple little box have to be expensive? In my opinion no. As long as the finish is good I prefer a cheaper box from the more expensive ones. If the size is right.

Little boxes are a nice solution for many storage needs and very flexible.

boxes, storage

Little boxes. IKEA VALJE. Image from Ikea.

Posted by nini in bedroom, decoration, Design, furniture, Furniture and Decoration, Interior Design, storage, 0 comments

Magazine racks of various origins

magazine rack

My inherited magazine rack. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

This is my inherited magazine rack. It comes from my parents and I have seen it all my life. It is made from bamboo and still going strong. It will probably last longer than I myself live… I still think this is a beautiful magazine rack. Despite being used for decades it has no damages at all.

magazine rack

My inherited magazine rack. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

I usually do not keep magazines in it… They tend to curl up in there. Presently I keep the connection cords from the TV to my MacBook Pro in it.

magazine rack

Magazine rack at Designtorget. Photo Designtorget from the internet.

The magazine rack above can be found at Designtorget. It costs SEK 395. They call it Tipack. Very simple. Right? Not sure I would like to pay SEK 395 for it though.

magazine rack

Magazine rack from Designtorget. Photo from Designtorget on the internet.

Also the magazine rack above is from Designtorget. Also costs SEK 395 like the other one. It is called Journal. Very simple too. Compare these two to the one below.

magazine rack

Magazine rack from Ikea. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

This one comes from Ikea. No, they do not sell it any more. I have had it for several years. It was meant to store magazines in until you carried them out to the recycling-container. The small hook at its back was meant for keeping a roll of cord for binding them into a bundle to carry them out. I think I paid something like SEK 39 or so for it. Very reasonable price…

magazine rack

My magazine rack with magazines in it. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

This is how this rack looks with magazines in it.

Any less decorative than the designer models above from Designtorget? Not in my eyes. They are all black. Lacquered metal. This one is normally used in my storage room and for its original usage: to keep old magazines and newspapers in until I cary them out to the recycling-container. But it could in my opinion serve as a magazine rack in a visible place any time.

magazine rack

Magazine rack seen from above. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Posted by nini in decoration, Furniture and Decoration, Interior Design, storage, 0 comments

Broken glass

glasscover

Broken glass cover. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Yesterday it happened. The glass cover of my almost new glass jar from Ikea (limited edition) broke. I wondered already when I bought it how long it would take before the cover would brake.

glasjar

Glass jar. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

I use the jar to store my coffee capsules. Not really necessary with a cover. Still, would be nice to have one…

glassjar

Glassjar with cover. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

What made it brake was that I missed the jar in height when putting the cover on and instead smashed the cover, full force inte the edge of the jar. Doing that has to do with how I see things. I often misjudge the distance between things. It is not the first time I smash something by pushing it into another thing full force, thinking that the edges are somewhere else.

Was barefoot at the time and said to myself, do not move until the shards are found… Found one.  Not the second one. The 2nd one I found inside the jar this morning. Might be able to glue the shards together. Meanwhile will use it without cover.

glassjar

Glassjar without cover. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Posted by nini in Furniture and Decoration, Interior Design, storage, 0 comments

New shelves in the kitchen

kitchen, shelves, enudden, shelves, ikea

Small, new shelves in the kitchen. Photo. ©nini.tjader.2015

I’ve put up two small shelves in the kitchen. Bought them already before Xmas and have been planning to put them up ever since. Now they are up on the wall. I moved all my different kinds of tea (+ one decorative can with cacao) to the shelves which created better space in the Billy cupboard to the right.

kitchen, shelves, enudden, shelf, ikea

Enudden shelves from Ikea. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

The shelves are white lacquered steel and come from Ikea. They are called ENUDDEN and cost SEK39 a piece. Or USD 7.99. They can be put either as I did, with the sides pointing up, or the other way around with the sides pointing down. I’ve also seen examples when two combined are put with the top one with sides pointing down and the bottom one pointing up. They they can become a good little shelf for pocket books for instance.

Posted by nini in Furniture and Decoration, Interior Design, kitchen, storage, 0 comments

Drawers instead of shelves in the kitchen cupboards

kitchen, cupboard

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

For a very long time I was irritated by my largest kitchen-cupboard. Why? Because it is a lower cupboard stuck against the wall which made it very difficult to see what was in it and to move things in and out of it. I also needed some kind of pantry as this flat doesn’t have one. I’ve so far used a low Billy shelf with doors as pantry. It’s been Ok, kind of, but it took up valuable floor space and it lately began to fall apart (the backside I nailed to the shelves from the back as it kept falling out).

kitchen, cupboards, Billy

Photo. ©nini.tjader.2015

The dining-table much needed to be moved closer to the right to get enough space to sit on the other side. Also, the space to open the door to the cupboard was not sufficient at all.

So I checked alternatives and came to the conclusion that drawers instead of shelves in that cupboard would be a good solution. I could then get rid of the Billy cupboard, move the table to the right, and get good overview in the drawers of the content. The drawers would act as pantry.

Unfortunately I could not use Ikea drawers in the cupboard as my cupboards are from Marbodal and the measures are not the same. That made it much more expensive. I ordered them a couple of weeks ago and got them last week.

Billy, pantry, cupboard

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Emptied the Billy cupboard, removed the doors, took out the shelves and put the Billy cupboard out into the bicycle shed… waiting for the spring-container for large stuff to throw it away.

kitchen, pantrycontent kitchen, pantrycontent

All the pantry-content on the table and the floor…

kitchen, cupboards

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Billy now gone from this spot. I then removed the door and the shelves of the cupboard that was to receive the drawers and cleaned the space.

kitchen, cupboards

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

The drawers came partly assembled so I only had to attach the front and to put up the rails for the drawers.

kitchen, cupboards, drawers

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

After some struggle with the drawers I got them in. The pictured description of how to do that was not all that clear, but after some testing and swearing I learned that the rails were to be inside all the way and not out to be able to attach the drawers. Success!

kitchen, drawers

Photo. ©nini.tjader.2015

To get the drawers in the right way I also had to adjust the next two doors slightly to get it right.

kitchen, drawers

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Mission accomplished, except for the handles.

kitchen, cupboards, drawers

Photo. ©nini.tjader.2015

No, the broom is not standing there any more. It has moved to the walk in closet to be out of the way…

kitchen, table

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Dining-table was moved to the right and the ceiling-lamp too. It is no longer hard to get in behind the table at the left side.

I then put in Ikeas drawer mats in the drawers and filled them with all the pantry stuff (dry goods). I then created the templates for the holes for the handles and taped them to the drawers. It is a question of measuring carefully and finding the middle of the drawer and the distance from the top of the drawer-front and where the holes for the handles should go. It is somewhat scary to drill holes into the all new fronts…

kitchen, drawers, templates_for_handles

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

kitchen, drawers, templates_for_handles

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

Had to go out to buy an appropriate drill-head to be able to do the holes for the handles. Below the result after drilling the holes and attaching the handles.

kitchen, cupboards, drawers

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

kitchen, cupboards, drawers

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

I am happy with the result. I finally have drawers instead of shelves and useful drawers for all the dry stuff easily seen and reached. And I no longer have to crawl on the floor to be able to see what is in that cupboard… Neither do I have to remove half the content to get at what I need. This is how it ought to have been from the beginning. By the way, the drawers are self-closing and very silent too.

I still have to rearrange the decorations on the wall now that Billy is no longer there. It looks off as it is now.

The whole thing costed SEK 4215 for the parts from Marbodal. Delivery took about two weeks. The drawer mats from Ikea costed SEK 39 and the new drill head for wood with sharp tip SEK 28. The Marbodal fronts are 13 mm thick. Had I chosen the thicker ones – which they at first quoted to me – the whole thing would have costed another SEK 2000… so I chose the simpler ones, which are the same as the doors to all the other cupboards.

The doors to the Billy cupboard are for sale. Contact me if you are interested.

kitchen, drawer

Upper drawer. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

kitchen, drawer

Middle drawer. Photo: ©nini.tjader.2015

kitchen, drawer

Bottom drawer. Photo:©nini.tjader.2015

Posted by nini in Furniture and Decoration, Interior Design, kitchen, 0 comments

Little boxes

Image from ELLOS

Image from ELLOS

Due to the lack of space in the bedroom, I am always looking for storage solutions close to the bed as there isn’t enough space for a bedside table. I’ve tried various solutions. It would be nice to be able to put a glass of water within reach of the bed.

Presently I have one small white box on the wall beside the headboard. I have two of those boxes but presently only use one of them. When I – soon – paint the entire wall, I will move the headboard slightly to the right, and the bed-lamps as well. Then I will move this box down a bit and then place the second one even lower. That will be the closest to a bedside table I will get.

bedroomwall

Photo: ©nini.tjader.2014

Those little boxes I have, I got from ELLOS. They have sold them for a couple of years by now. Still cost only SEK149 a piece. They also come in black.

There are similar ones out there. From MONTANA for instance… A totally different price though…€231. Comes in white, black or brown.

box, montana

Box from Montana. Image from Ambient Direct.

The difference? The MONTANA box is a bit deeper and it has a backside toward the wall. The ELLOS box has no backside. It was this picture though that made me think of how to place the two boxes from ELLOS which I already have. One at the height of the bed, the second one higher up, in line with the top of the head-board, so a glass and pitcher can be placed there.

To be continued.

Posted by nini in Furniture and Decoration, Interior Design, 0 comments

Storage in the walk-in-closet

storage

This is my walk-in-closet. Or rather, it was supposed to be… I use it mainly for storage of another kind than clothes and such. To the left is a 80 cm wide BILLY bookcase. Plus extra shelves on top. Right ahead is a 60 cm BILLY bookcase. No, IKEA doesn’t sell that size any more. Which is a pity as it is a good size. On top of that are stored extra shelves both for BILLY and BESTÅ. In the middle is a huge roll of carpet… That is my second living room carpet which I got for free from a neighbor who was about to throw it out. Exactly the same size, quality and make (IKEA) as the one I am presently using which is blue. But this one was bought in the Netherlands.

storage

Above is how it looks to the right. Hangers for clothes. Three shelves. When I moved in it was just one shelf so I added two as the system for them allowed that. On the shelves are mainly pillow cases, curtains, and pillows for chairs. Under the clothes-rack, there is a largish chest which you cannot see in the picture. There I store pillows and out of season duvets for the bed.

storage

Under the bar with hangers just inside the door is my big document cabinet. Contains all important documents you can think of. I know. I have to do some cleaning out of papers one of these days. My toothbrush get charged in here. On top of the document cabinet is a pile of magazine holders that I kept after throwing out their content when I moved here, to reduce the number of old magazines and other paper-stuff. Don’t think I will ever have to buy new magazine-holders again. These will last for the rest of my life I think. To the left you can also spy some pillows not presently used.

storage

In the BILLY bookcase at the end of the walk-in-closet there are, except for the extra shelves for BILLY and BESTÅ bookcases and cupboards, various boxes with various stuff and some binders with papers about the flat. On the top are a number of camera stands that I’ve not used for years. And some small carpets I intend to make pillow cases from. Some of this stuff shouldn’t be in here… like the knitting and sewing stuff, the button collection that my mother started long ago, and similar things. Should be together with other sewing stuff. Which is in the bedroom. Except for various textiles which are in the main storage room… hmm.

storage

On the lefthand side at the end there is an IVAR shelf that on the top has all my old slides. I’ve scanned about one third of them and made digital, but the rest still remain… Need to do that before they become impossible to look at. That is the problem with slides. They deteriorate and get real bad with age. Under them are some boxes with paper-photos that are not in albums. And some boxes with old hand-written letters from various friends.

storage

In the BILLY shelf to the left I have more extra BESTÅ shelves at the top, then some binders with letters and writings, and then comes the IKEA plastic boxes that hold all kinds of stuff that has to do with electrics, tools, and other handiwork. The division of things that ought to be in the same place happened when I moved here and I still, after 4.5 years, haven’t got it quite right. The first step towards a more organized storage was getting all the transparent plastic boxes from Ikea and get all the tools and lamps and such into them.

storage

And more of the same.

storage

The bottom ones hold various lamps to change to when a lamp is finished. And the blue thing is my toolbox.

This space has good ventilation and a power outlet which I presently use to charge my toothbrush. The bathroom is just beside it so it is close by.

The walk-in-closet used for storage is actually quite organized. Need to mark the plastic boxes though so I can find things faster. They are transparent so you see what is inside them, but they still need to get marked.

I’d love to use this space as a walk-in-closet, as it is supposed to be… but I can forget about that unless I start to throw things out both here and in the storage room I wrote about earlier.

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Posted by nini in storage, Various, 0 comments

Storage, a constant headache

At the time when my present flat was built (2003) the standard was to build the storage space inside the flat.

So I have no outside storage place. We have a common bicycle storage place shared by us in the same house (6 households) that we also partly use for some gardenstuff, like the grill and such things. But it is not supposed to be used for that. We who use it have an unofficial oral agreement between us that we can do that though, in addition to store the bicycles there. There are only four bicycles in it presently. That standard, to build the storage room inside the flat, has changed since, and now they no longer build like that (I learned that from Monica in Umeå when she moved into her brand new flat there, which was planned with storage inside the flat, but in the end it got moved to another place). Standard now again is that storage is outside or in a special space.

My flat has two spaces to store things. One is the dedicated storage room, the other is the walk-in closet. Let us talk about the dedicated storage space first.

storage space

The storage space is immediately to the left when you enter the flat. This is the left side of it. There I keep an old Ikea Billy low bookcase for shoe-storage for those shoes that are not in season presently. It works for me as the depth of the shelf is just enough for my shoe-size. On top of it is a bathroom cupboard that contains wall-paint and brushes… I would love to have that cupboard in the bathroom (the cupboard, not the paint and brushes) but I don’t want to make holes in the tiles there. After that is the cabinet for cleaning stuff that originally was in the corner in my second hall where I today have my workspace. Resting against its wall is a full size ladder and a projector-table.

To get something out from here you first have to move what is in the way…

Just inside the door are the bags with papers and such which will go to the paper container for recycling eventually.

storage

This is the right side of the space. It has quite deep shelves all the way from the bottom up that can store a lot of things. In the middle you find various suitcases, non-used pictureframes with or without pictures, the shopping bag, a non-used lamp-shade, the winter-decorations for the railing at the outside place…

I have those big black boxes (from Granit) to hide the stuff in and keep it reasonably ordered. Like Xmas decorations, empty flowerpots, and everything else you can imagine. Over the winter the mower also lives in this space. Here is also all recycle stuff in various bags. And the vacuum cleaner which ought to be in the cleaning cupboard but then it gets really difficult to get it out when needed.

It is actually a light, well-lit space with the same hardwood floor as the entire flat. It even has an electric outlet. If I had less stuff to store, it could have been used as a work-room…

storage

On the door to the storage room are over-the-door-hangers that keep the Ikea recycle-bags for plastic bottles, cans, batteries, dead lamps… All this recycling takes a lot of space. Even if I would throw out a lot of things from here, there are still the re-cycling storage that take up the space.

I know what I have in this space and I can find everything, but I am not happy with the space because of all the reshuffling it takes to get something out of here. If I could get most of it in on the shelves… Then I would be able to enter without having to climb over all this stuff.

I know. I have too much stuff. Don’t we all?

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Posted by nini in ordermaking, 0 comments

Bedside storage

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I have a problem with bedside storage as my bedroom isn’t big enough for everything I need to keep there. For instance somewhere to keep bedside books and a glass of water…

To the right of the bed in the picture there are three wardrobes. With doors that need to be possible to opened. There were no sliding doors for that size of wardrobes at the time when I bought them (one of the doors is a full-size floor-to-ceiling mirror). There are sliding doors now for this size of wardrobes… but I am not going to change them. Too expensive. To the left there is one corner bookcase and two more bookcases.

I know you are not supposed to have that much stuff in the bedroom, but I have no choice. The flat is small and I have too many books… unfortunately need the storage. So the above is how it looked until a couple of days ago.

When I moved into this flat I had a 180 cm wide double bed. Soon realized I needed to downsize as it was a real struggle each time the bed had to be made up (like, daily…). I still miss my 180 cm bed though… I love big beds.

Switched to a 120 cm wide bed – after first considering 140 cm but abandoning that as it didn’t give enough extra space. So that is what I now have. But I still had problems finding a good solution for where to keep the bedside books and the glass of water.

The shorter white picture-list was not a good solution. Too narrow. And I didn’t want things to fall down on me in the bed… (I move a lot when sleeping).

I’ve had though for quite some time two boxes meant to be placed on the wall as shelves. But I had mislaid their holders during a period when I used them in the kitchen, not attached to the wall… Looked all over for those holders now that I needed them. Finally found them last week. All my screws and other holders got sorted in the process of looking for those holders.

Now the boxes are up on the wall above the bed and the picture-list is taken down.

This is the result. Much better as they don’t need any floor-space. The boxes were bought from Ellos who still sell them. Newspaper-shelves they call them. They have them in white or black. SEK149 a piece. Can be placed any direction you want. No backside.bedroom, storage, shelves

bedroom, storage, shelves

The one to the right is supposed to hold the water-bottle and glass. The basket to the right holds the bed-spread during the night so I don’t have to put it on the floor.

Posted by nini in Furniture and Decoration, Interior Design, 0 comments