How to be a storage weirdo.
Secret: There's no "right place" to store anything. Okay... I'm not advising you store, say, yogurt in the bathroom. Because gross. But beyond temperature requirements, you can pretty much do anything you want. Every space and brain are different. And if you want to store your sunglasses inside of a poster tube in your linen closet--and that works for you---who am I to tell you not to. I myself am a self-proclaimed storage weirdo (and offered up one example of how in New Order).
Here are a few other items I store in untraditional places. Why? Because there are no rules...only choices.
1. Shoes in drawers.
I have limited floor space in my closet and ample drawer space in my dresser. That's just how my bedroom rolls. So I choose to store most of my shoes in two of those dresser drawers. They're easy as heck to access...and that's kind of all there is to say about that. Highly recommend.
2. Bags + clothes on walls.
Another thing I've got in my bedroom is ample wall space. So when the closet hanging rod space felt tight, I decided to hang a handful of bags and dresses on my wall instead. I hammered a few cheap nails into the wall and put hangers and bag straps on them. Easy. As long as you don't pile on too many, this is an aesthetically pleasing option, too. I enjoy seeing those pieces when I walk in the door...they feel honored hung up there. P.S. I also use nails and hooks on my bedroom walls to hang belts. Efficient and nearly cost-free.
3. Files in a kitchen cabinet.
When I moved into my new home 5+ years ago, I decided I hated the look of my traditional filing cabinet and I no longer wanted it in my main space. Instead, I spent $20 at Staples and bought two file crates. Now they live in a very accessible cabinet under my kitchen counter. Since doing a humongous paper purge this past year, I've whittled down to only one crate. And my old file cabinet was repurposed as extra storage for the garage (where I have no aesthetic cares or desires).
4. Piano (or creative space) in a closet.
Some of you may have heard my story about how I became a singer-songwriter after giving my keyboard a home inside a closet (in my former apartment). Instead of keeping it inaccessible in its case (and therefore 1000x less likely to be played), I gave it a permanent home--set up, always on, and ready to use. I'm convinced that I may never have discovered songwriting if that piano still lived in its case. Part of the reason I may have left it packed up is the thinking that I had no space for it to be set up out in the living room. By being a storage weirdo instead, I chose to clear out a closet (of stuff I mostly didn't need anyway) -- and the rest is history.
As long as you can access what you need when you need it, you've fulfilled the definition of organization. But more importantly, you've done something to create ease and comfort in your everyday life. (That's why we do this stuff, remember?!) So forget everything you learned about where things should go -- and what fancy containers you're supposed to buy to store them in. What's important is knowing what you have and having easy access.
Happy storing, weirdos.