How to get your home organized with these 5 unique storage ideas for small spaces.
We've lived in 11 homes during our marriage so we've been able to experience a lot of different kinds of spaces. Our biggest house was 3500 square feet and the smallest was around 1000 square feet. Oak Cottage is one of the smallest homes we've ever lived in, at 1100 square feet, so carving out usable storage space has been a challenge.
Unique Storage Ideas for Small Spaces
DIY Platform Bed with Storage
We built our platform bed with storage when we lived in our Chicago house to solve space issues in a guest bedroom. It's a simple design with tons of storage underneath and wheels so that we can move it around. It now sits in a guest bedroom in Oak Cottage, where the storage space is seriously limited. The under bed baskets definitely help with that.
DIY Refrigerator Cabinet
Another build in our Chicago house, this DIY refrigerator cabinet is actually one of our most popular DIY's. We built it when we were doing our complete kitchen remodel and it made such a huge difference in a very small space.
The fridge was rather large so the cabinet helped this monster blend into the kitchen a bit better and gave us a ton of usable storage that was easy to reach (not like the cabinet that was there before).
IKEA Rast Hack
When you live in a small, older home, you have to get creative with storage. That's what I did with the IKEA Rast that I put together. I just painted it white, added some jute rope handles and some wheels and put it to our front porch.
It's the perfect spot to keep some gardening tools, candles and doggie necessities. It also gave me a surface to add a bit of outdoor decor, like a potted plant and a lantern.
DIY Barn Wood Shelves
I never used open shelving in the kitchen until we did our kitchen remodel in our Chicago house. For the short time that we were able to enjoy our new kitchen, I loved having the open shelf. I only put out our every day dishes like plates, bowl and glasses...the kind of things you use on a daily basis, but I loved how convenient it was.
I knew that when we moved to North Carolina that no matter what house we bought, I was going to use barn wood shelves again. True to my promise we removed an old, dusty wine storage cabinet and installed 2 barn wood shelves. Again, I filled one with every day dishes and the other with a plant and a few decor pieces.
I still love having them. Not only do they add some character to the kitchen but they are great for extra storage. We don't have a lot of kitchen cabinets so putting our dishes out freed up space for other necessities...like food.
DIY Storage Stools
I couldn't let the opportunity pass without sharing these DIY storage ottomans that I built for our cargo trailer conversion. Not only can they be used in an RV but I can think of lots of places to use them in our house. Right now I use them to store our dog supplies, like towels and toys, and dirty clothes.
They would work great in our house though, for extra blanket storage. Plus they have the added bonus of offering extra seating, and that's always welcome in a small space where seating is at a premium.
So that's 5 of our unique storage ideas that we've used in our smaller homes. Really though, you could use any one of these ideas no matter the size of your space. I'd love to hear about your unique storage ideas.
JanL says
Thanks for sharing. We too live in a small house, just under,1000 square feet. Our 11 year old has his LEGOs in a plastic underbed container, that he can slide out to play. I found a wonderful armoire that allows NERF gun collection &toy storage behind lower doors, winter hats, gloves, pj's in drawer, and sports clothes, hoodies, (from every school,sport,) long sleeve shirts, bed linens, etc. in containers. On the top shelves behind doors A wonderfully helpful piece in his room. I appreciate your ideas to help me consider improving my home. How do you store all the pots, pans, appliances in your kitchen? My husband likes gadgets, recently brought home an inside grill '(as seen on TV'!)! We had to measure cabinets to rearrange to allow space for his beloved item.
Kristi says
Thanks Jan! I remember those days of finding good ways to store our kid's toys. It sounds like you've come up with some great ideas. As for our kitchen storage, I try to keep only things that we really need. Our pots and pans are stored in our kitchen island and the gadgets that we do need are stored in our corner lazy susan cabinet. If we don't use something often, but we aren't quite ready to part with it, we store it in the basement. We don't have a pantry so storage is definitely tricky in our small kitchen.
Pat M. says
In my kitchen I have a narrow wall that is just the right size for a 5 shelf, 24" industrial wire shelving unit that I don't know what I would do without. It houses a green plant, my cookbooks, liquor bottles on a tray, wine bottles in a rack and a set of very pretty but large hand painted mixing bowls. I can't even imagine trying to find a place for all of that behind doors in my limited amount of cabinet space - and it looks nice too.
You've done great things in your home and in Minnie, Kristi, and have been an inspiration to me.
Kristi says
Thanks so much, Pat! I like your idea of a narrow shelving unit for added storage. I so wanted something like that in our space but we just don't have the wall space. Thanks for sharing your idea!