Packing for College: Your Closet

Here's where we get to the fun part of college packing: YOUR CLOSET!!

Your closet is going to be your very best friend. (Well, besides your desk...and your bed...) So, you need to treat it right!

Now, I have absolutely no idea what your closet is going to look like. I'm just going to talk about how my closet was, and how I organized it. You can obviously change these rules to suit your needs!

1. Hangers
Yeah, hangers are going to be uber-important! Your dorm certainly isn't going to come with them! I bought a bunch of plastic ones at Wal-Mart, but you can find whatever kind works for you. Looking for the $20-for-10 kind of hangers from Bed, Bath, & Beyond? Go for it. Far be it from me to tell you what type of hangers you're going to need!

If you want to hang up your pants as well, get some pants hangers. If you're just going to be hanging shirts (and, eventually, jackets), just normal hangers will do. (Skirt hangers, too, y'all! You never know when you might need something semi-fancy.)

2. Command Hooks
These are literally the best things ever. They're cheap, they're easy to apply, and they come off with no damage! (Which is great, because dorms charge you if there's damage that wasn't there when you moved in.)

Stick a couple to the inside of your closet door to hang belts, purses, and possible an umbrella or a hoodie, so that you're not taking up valuable closet space with these items. (Some closets will be small. Thankfully, I had more than enough room in my closet!)

3. Folding Laundry Hampers
Notice that I said "hampers," with an s on the end. That's right - you're going to want TWO hampers. One for your light clothes, one for your dark clothes. I started off the year with just one hamper, and by the third week I had bought another one.

The one I have for light clothes is smaller, because I don't have *that* many light clothes. I try to wash my darks at least once a week; my lights can sometimes go three weeks, because I'll only have one pair of socks or a pair of underwear in there. Unless I'm in an unusually happy mood, in which case I'll wear more light colors and will have to wash that particular load of laundry.

You can easily find these in your local Wal-Mart (or Target), and probably your local drugstore (Walgreens, CVS) as well. They're literally everywhere around college move-in time! They come in all sorts of colors and designs as well. I got really, really cheap ones that are plain, but they held up very well!

4. A Hanging Organizer
Now, this one's COMPLETELY optional! But I know you know what I mean.

I'm talking about those organizers that are rectangular in shape, hang on the rod in your closet, and have about five to seven "bins" or "shelves" for you to put things in. You can put shoes in them, or you can plan out the week's outfits in advance and put them in the bins, complete with underwear and sock choices.

Personally, I never used this thing (I have one at my house that my mother bought me AGES ago), but my roommate last year used hers a ton. (I think she used hers for planning outfits.)

There are also a few other types of hanging organizers, namely shoe and jewelry organizers. (I know that Bed, Bath, & Beyond also makes one for scarves.) If you feel as if you need to keep everything in OCD-order, then these may be worth looking into. If you're a "I dress as I feel" type of person, then you might want to hold back on these. (Although the shoe one would be cool.)

5. A Plastic Dresser
I got a three-drawer "organizer" from Wal-Mart. It's really wide, and it fits perfectly in the bottom of my closet. I use this to hold my underwear, bras, socks, and jeans, as well as some t-shirts that I don't feel like hanging up. (Namely, my Library Summer Reading t-shirts and my pajamas.) This year, I might also keep my towels & extra sheets in it.

This is really useful because you're not going to have anywhere else to PUT your underwear/small things. You might have an underwear drawer at home, but your closet doesn't come equipped with one of these! Your little drawer thing can be skinny or fat, and you can choose what color it comes in. (Mine's white, although I may try to figure out how to decorate the top of it... Stickers and packing tape? Printed images and packing tape? Lamination and Doctor Who quotes?)

6. CLOTHES!
What do you want to say with your clothing while you're in college? Do you want to give yourself a complete makeover, or do you want to expand on your current style? Do you feel as if you'd do better as a punk instead of a prep, or a hipster instead of a goth? 

One of the best things about college is that nobody knows who you were in the past. You can completely re-invent yourself, with little to no consequences. (I say "little" because there's also the chance that one person will screw everything up and turn out like a jerk instead of a newer and better person.) 

Pick your style! Do you want to go ahead and buy a new wardrobe, or do you want to stick to what you've got and see what happens while you're in college? Do you want to just keep your old clothes, but figure out new ways to wear them?

There are a ton of sites on the internet that can help with fashion and styling and all sorts of stuff. You can look on Pinterest for inspiration. You can stalk fashion blogs (obviously, this one is not a fashion blog!). You can do whatever you want that makes you happy.

Make sure that you're doing this for you, not so that you can "make friends" or "fit in." THERE IS NO FITTING IN IN COLLEGE. Everyone's on their own. Everyone stands out. Of course, some stand out more than others (the guy who walks around in cosplay all day? Lives in the dorm next to me), and others blend into the background. Make an effort to look neat and complete every day, and you're going to go far.

Just don't spend your tuition money on a new wardrobe. That's not only idiotic, but you'll probably get kicked out of college, end up with a minimum-wage job, and have to flip burgers for the rest of your life. (Not. Cool.) Plus, what if you don't like that wardrobe a few weeks into college? Better wait until you get there and figure out what you want to do, and then buy yourself some new clothes. (But not a ton. And remember: Never leave the store without something to go with it, or without knowing what it will go with once you get back to your house. Otherwise, you'll end up with a closet full of stuff, but absolutely nothing to wear. Think about it.)

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Wasn't that informative? (Or at the very least, I hope it was.)

Did you learn anything new? Is there something that really stood out to you about this article? Or do you have something that you'd like to add?

Is there something that you keep in your closet that I didn't mention above? LET ME KNOW! Tell me all about it in the comments - and remember, I read & reply to absolutely everything that's written here, so don't be shy!