The key to creating a “creative” closet is to use your imagination and personalize the space as much as possible. People have hobbies, collections or odd tastes that could be accommodated by a creatively designed closet. Do you like to sew? Do you have a lot of camera equipment? Do you have a lot more shoes than you are willing to admit? Whatever is special about you and your storage needs should be used to create your personal creative closet.

Let’s take photography equipment, for example. This could also go for any electronic equipment, like video games, old home movies, computer parts, pretty much anything that you would like to keep stored away, safe and dust free. Your creative closet might include a cabinet system instead of a shelf system. You will probably want to be able to seal up the area where these things are kept to protect them from the massive amount of lint that is created when you take out and put clothes into a closet each day.

You can build a tall series of shelves, depending on how much storage space that you need, and then screw on a pre-fabricated cabinet door to seal it off. Don’t use a magnet closure if you are worried about it affecting your equipment. You can install a child-proof cabinet lock to keep out children if you’d like. Doors with a clear plastic or frosted glass front look really nice in a closet and allow you to see what is inside without opening the door. Use bags that are padded and seal well to protect your equipment even more.

Craft supplies are also sometimes kept in the closet. For instance, if you sew, but you don’t have a sewing room, you may need to store your sewing machine, material, patterns, and a plethora of small items like pins, threaders and thread. You can create a sewing station in your closet, much in the same fashion as the electronic system mentioned above.

Pegs can be installed or a thread rack hung to hold many spools of thread on the outside of the cabinet right where you can see it. You can attach hooks for scissors, measuring tape, elastic and other items that you use often. Inside you can have a shelf for your sewing machine and foot pedal. Use an organizer to keep track of all of those tiny items that come along with a sewing hobby. Stacks of material and scraps can be kept in crates, baskets or bins inside the cabinet.

Use your creativity to make your closet meet your special needs. To make more room for specific types of storage, you may want to compress the amount of space that your clothes take up by using specialty pants hangers, shirt hangers and skirt hangers that allow you to cascade clothing from one simple hook. Remember, this is your closet and it should fit your needs!