TSABD at Home: My Office Fashion Closet Makeover Preview!

Welcome to the first TSABD at Home! Like I mentioned in an earlier post about blogging differently this year, you can expect these type of posts (when available) on Thursdays. I’ll also be alternating fun trend posts (also when available) on Thursdays as well. Make sure you’re subscribed to the blog to get update notifications right in your inbox so you don’t miss a thing ;)

Background story:

A few months ago I turned a spare bedroom into my home office (it used to be my sister’s room, but she bought a house and moved out). It’s not complete because I’m taking my time with making sure it’s how I want it to look. I didn’t want to get all overzealous and buy things to decorate only to wind up changing my mind months later. I don’t have money like that to waste. So what I’ve been doing is living on Pinterest since forever (follow me!) searching for inspo pics until I decide what I really, REALLY want.

I knew I wanted this room to be mostly white because white reflects light very well and I want to be able to take pictures and video in here. I also needed of course for it to be a functioning office with room for me to store working inventory (aka makeup and clothes) and filming equipment. I have the room somewhat the way I want it, but I of course need some more things to really complete it and there’s a huge industrial sewing machine in here (long story) that I need to get rid of so I can move things around the way I really want to.

There’s also the fact that I have a very busy mind and tend to leave things hanging around that to some folks might look like clutter (ok, it’s totally clutter…lol). I’ve been working to do better when it comes to keeping things in order—I’m at least 20 times better than I used to be.

*cues Jennifer Hudson Dreamgirls rendition of I Am Changing*

So right now I’m in the process of not only finishing up this office but also making other changes around the apartment one bit at a time. I’ll be sharing some of the projects I do here on the blog and on my Youtube channel—make sure you SUBSCRIBE!

Coming soon: my office fashion closet makeover!

I’ve been in this apartment since forever and hadn’t realized the potential of these closets. I’d had the idea in my head that I was going to buy a house in Georgia where my family lives and move but changed my mind (like three times—smh). So instead of living foul I might as well make the most of what I have. Tami Roman (loooove her Bonnet Chronicles) had a post up on her IG the other day about appreciating what you have right now and it’s SO true. I don’t have the budget right now to have a house like the immaculately decorated ones I see on Pinterest—but I do have imagination and I can get things done gradually with the budget I do have. My Virgo mind had me set up to think that if I couldn’t get things to look the way I wanted, I’d just not do anything…lol. Backwards logic, but perhaps another fellow Virgo might understand…lol.

So because my office is so white and because I want to also use it as a space to snap quick photos, Snapchat, and have a nice space to try on outfits and what not, I moved all of my “outside” and “blogger” clothes and shoes in here. All of my other “house” clothes, gym clothes, and knockabout clothes are in my bedroom. I also need a small section of the closet to store photoshoot props (like the Christmas decorations you see peeking out in some of the pics…lol).

In my defense, I took these before pics after I had rummaged through the closet and hadn’t really put things back the way they should have been (I blame my hard transition from holiday break). But what’s a before pic without a little rummaging…lol.

What needs to be done:

I LOVE my closet but it definitely needs some sprucing up. First things first it needs paint ASAP. I’m not even going to play myself and try to do it myself (although I *could* but yeah, no) and since I’m also planning on getting my bedroom painted (just not 100% sure which colors yet), I’m going to wait to hire someone to paint both on the same day. Might as well get it all done so I don’t have to be out of the way twice. I had the office itself painted a very bright white so I’ll probably do the closet in the same color.

The closet floor needs a rug—I will likely go to a fabric store or somewhere I can have something cut to specific dimensions. I might do a faux sheepskin piece in white.

I also need a light for the top of the closet because it can get pretty dark up there where I have my shoes stored. I’ll be on the lookout for stylish LED-type battery-operated lights that I can stick in there without having to wire anything.

I need a much more stylish way to store all my over the knee boots and had been semi-looking for a while and found some boot shapers I’m going to try from Amazon. Container Store also sells boot shapers but they didn’t seem to have any that worked for over the knee boots plus I didn’t want to spend much on these. I’ll keep you posted on how the Amazon ones work out. From the reviews I read, people seemed to like them.

I’m also toying with the idea of putting up a mirror or perhaps some sort of accent decal or something on the inside closet door. I saw a super cute mirror at Urban Outfitters that was SO me, but I couldn’t decided if I really needed it so I didn’t buy it and it sold out…lol. It wasn’t meant to be.

When I first started using this closet, I only used the white wooden hangers from IKEA so everything was uniform. I can’t even tell you how all these other hangers got in there but they have to go…lol. I need to buy more hangers though next time I’m in IKEA.

Yes, velvet hangers might be sleeker and can afford me more hanging space, but I like the wooden ones better. For now. Plus having a little less space prevents me from trying to fill it up with stuff. But yeah, who knows—I may change my mind in the future and get velvet hangers. But at least hangers are something I can switch around very easily and inexpensively unlike if I bought some big piece of furniture and then got tired of it.

I had this office professionally painted but looks like maybe someone sneezed and paint got on the doorknob…lol. No big deal, I can use a much cooler knob there anyway. I’ll be on the lookout for really cool gold ones. I’m also contemplating if I should get some sort of statement piece to hang outside the closet door. I usually don’t have a coat hanging there. I don’t know—maybe I’ll get a piece of artwork or something. It’ll come to me.

I also made a quick video so you can see more of the closet before the makeover. It was a little too big for me to host it here on my blog, so I had to upload to Vimeo (and it didn’t warrant a whole Youtube upload—but do make sure you’re subscribed to me on Youtube though—I post more in-depth content over there).

There’s also no volume on these (like I did for my bronzer demo videos) because I know a lot of you read the blog at work and can’t have some video blasting…lol.

TSABD at Home: My Fashion Closet Makeover (Before) from Danielle Gray on Vimeo.

So I’m excited! It might take me a while to track down some of the pieces because I really want a certain kind of style for some things (like the doorknob and the battery-operated light fixture).

Leave me a comment! Have you ever done a closet makeover? Closet makeover as in the actual appearance of the closet—not the actual clothes—I’ve done clothes “makeovers” a gazillion times before. Any things I should look out for?