Folding and Filing Clothes and Organizing Drawers to Make More Room

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I recently helped T. organize the clothes drawers. in his bureau  The drawers were fairly well organized and had already been purged.  All I needed to do was help make more room by showing T. how to better fold and place his clothes in the drawers.
clothes folded in a drawer with title text reading File Your Clothes to Make More Room in Your Drawer

It wasn’t terrible to start, but I knew we could make more room for his clothes if I folded them like I do my shirts and file them rather than stacking them.

collage of 6 photos of steps to fold t-shirts.

I started with T.’s t-shirt drawer.  See, they’re neatly stacked.  Not so bad.  But I knew that every time he got a shirt he had to take the stack out of his drawer to find the t-shirt he wanted and then put the stack back into the drawer.  It was a bit of a hassle.

colorful t-shirts neatly folded and stacked in drawer.

But more importantly, I knew I could make a bunch more room for him if I filed his t-shirts rather than stacking them.  See how much more room there is.  The same number of tees are in both photos. Really.

t-shirts neatly folded and filed in open drawer.

Next I moved on to the sock and underwear drawer (although all images of anything embarrassing have been edited to make sure my friends and family will let me take pictures and help them again in the future).  Again, not terrible, but there’s a stack of t-shirts that could use my help.

Organized 31 - Make extra room in your drawer by filing your clothes

After filing his t-shirts, there’s space in the rear of the drawer for papers he’d kept under his shirt before (I didn’t peek at those papers, I promise!).  I simply rolled the socks and stood them on end.  Now they’re easy to see and it’s easy to rotate the socks from the wash FIFO (first in first out. doesn’t everyone rotate their socks?)

Organized 31 - Make extra room in your drawer by filing your clothes

On to the sweater drawer.  The sweaters are all nicely stacked, but a hassle when he wants to wear the sweater at the bottom of the stack.

Organized 31 - Make extra room in your drawer by filing your clothes

Here they are folded in half one more time and filed rather than stacked.  It’s great this way because T. can see exactly which sweater he wants and can take it out with no wrestling a pile of sweaters to do it.  I also filed similar colors together and put lighter colors in the back of the drawer  so that they show up a little better in the darker part of the drawer (if the dark sweaters are in the back of the drawer, they’re more difficult to see and can get “lost” back there).

Organized 31 - Make extra room in your drawer by filing your clothes

Last, but not least, was the drawer with work-out clothing.  It’s hard to tell from the photo, but there were 3 piles of different types of items.

Organized 31 - Make extra room in your drawer by filing your clothes

The items were folded in half one more time to fit in the drawer and filed, making extra room in the drawer.  You can also see every item as soon as you open the drawer. No more rummaging through piles (no mater how nicely stacked those piles were).

Organized 31 - Make extra room in your drawer by filing your clothes

So, the big question is what is T. going to do with the extra space he now has in his bureau?  What would you do with extra space in your clothing drawers?

colorful socks folded and rolled on wood table.

Tips on how to fold socks.

jeans folded in a black and white striped fabric box with title text reading How to Fold & Organize Jeans

How to fold and organize jeans and make your closet (and life) much neater.

clothes folded in a drawer with paper signs in between them with text reading gym and field trip with title text reading Organize Clothing for Back-to-School

Easy tips to organize clothes for back-to-school and encourage independence in your child’s morning routine.

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16 Comments

  1. OMG I am 62 years old (63 tomorrow) and I never knew this. Tonight the drawers will be re-arranged and I also clicked on how to fold pj’s too. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Now I will be able to “file” more and everything won’t be wrinkled.

  2. Susan, you are brilliant, why have I never thought of this I don’t know! It also drives me crazy when they grab a t-shirt from the middle of the pile and they don’t hold up the stack, they just flip it up and yank! I am now going to fold his drawers like this to give him more room too! It is the simple things that make me happy!

  3. I have started doing this with Mr. B’s T-shirts and not only does it save space, it’s easier for him to find his favorites. I’ve also sorted them by color. I’ve saved him having to think as hard lol! Great inspiration Susan!

  4. You certainly did a great job in making space in the drawers Susan! I would use the space to put my many hair accessories!:)

  5. Hi Susan,I never really like dresser drawers because it’s hard to see your clothes and when you pull one out from the bottom of the stack, everything gets messy. Filing clothes is the perfect solution. Thanks for sharing.

  6. Wow, I’ve always folded my T shirts that way and just stacked them in 3 rows instead of 2!! Can’t wait to try the filing trick! We NEVER have enough room in our dressers… Thanks

  7. I would be ashamed if you ever saw the drawers in my house! I will have to try your tips and see if I can get organized and find my clothes!

    Thanks for sharing at the In and Out of the Kitchen Link Party! Always glad to see you there!

  8. Great organizational tips! I featured this from last week’s All Things Thursday Blog Hop. I hope you’ll be back to link up again tonight.Blessings,Nici

  9. This really works long term too. I did all my bedroom drawers about three years ago, because I moved form a large house to a small apartment, and they are still just as neat and tidy. I think it’s because it looks so neat and is so easy to choose what you want to wear you just want to keep it this way. xx

  10. I would love to do this as I have sooo much clothing but the problem is I live in a teeny tiny rental and all I have I 5 deep shelves in a built in cupboard. Any suggestions? (p.s. also currently in between work, and very short on cash.. and I live in South Africa, so don’t have access to a lot of common American products… ) I was thinking of rigging up a cardboard type pull out drawer/shelf insert but still in the hmm might be an idea/no clue how yet phase.. 😉 lol
    anyway..thanks for your website its giving me great ideas…
    xx

  11. I love that the pictures on the shirt are visible in just once glance! I am definitely going to try this with my boys’ clothes.

    1. I got tired of having my family digging through their drawers and making a mess. This solution works well for us and I hope it does for your family, too.

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