Spring is in full bloom following Fairfax’s annual SpringFest—and with the help of custom closet organizers, transitioning your wardrobe into the new season has never been easier.

Spring is coming quickly in Fairfax County, VA. We’ve already celebrated SpringFest in all its historic glory, temperatures are steadily growing warmer, and we’ve entered bear sighting season once again. As you take your family out for local hikes at Hidden Oaks, you’ve probably already snapped a photo or two of your little ones sitting among the spring beauties and trout lilies along your path. This may be the most beautiful time of the year.

Our family takes advantage of the turning of the seasons to organize, go through, and transition each of our closets into spring and summer—and our custom closet systems make the process so much smoother than it once was. Instead of packing your knitwear into under-the-bed storage or packing your winter coats away in the garage, try using the following tips to keep everything sorted in the closet year-round.

Use Dual Hanging Rods to Your Advantage

When you get a custom closet installed, you’re likely to incorporate several sets of dual hanging rods—one above head height and one at waist height. These sections make use of your tall ceilings and are great for keeping your winter coats separate from the outfits you wear for the Fairfax County rugby league games every summer.

Consider migrating your sections each season for easier access in your walk-in closet. Move your knitwear, wool pants, and other seasonal items farther back into the closet and store them together in one of your dual hanging sections. This leaves an open section closer to the entrance for sundresses, khaki shorts, and spring blouses.

In a kids’ closet, you can use the dual hanging rods in a slightly different manner. Consider moving their winter jackets, coats, and sweaters to hang on the upper hanging rod, while their spring wardrobe resides on the lower. Keep appropriate clothing right within their reach while leaving winter items accessible for cleaning or size-checking later on. (No more hunting through the attic to see if your growing seven-year-old will still fit in her peacoat when they’re running an early-spring closeout sale!)

Make Your Tall Ceilings Work for You

A common homeowner’s lament is that space is wasted in their closets because they have such high ceilings, leaving a lot of wall space unused—unless you plan on stacking plastic tubs four deep on your top shelf. That just doesn’t work out when a cold front moves in again and you need to bring a coat with you on a chilly April day on the Orange Line. Custom closet systems put this problem to bed and help you utilize the entire height of even your reach-in spaces.

In the example above, built-in shelves go up all the way to the ceiling and leave perfectly portioned sections for clothing to be stored away when it’s not needed. I always enjoy shuffling the contents of these closet shelves when the season changes. Nobody ever said your custom closet had to stay the same! Ideally, you’d like items that you currently wear to be at eye level for easy access. Out-of-season items should move up toward the ceiling, and upcoming items get the spaces closest to the floor.

Movement keeps things interesting and also gives you and your family access to the clothing items that you need during the springtime with minimal effort. This rotating-shelves strategy lets your custom closets take the place of your under-the-bed storage nightmare.

Shoe Shelves Are Adjustable for a Reason

Think about it: starting in about mid-April, you’re not going to need those winter boots any longer for your daily commute to Tysons. You might not be all the way into sandals yet, but the shoes you reach for on a daily basis are certainly shifting. When your custom walk-in closet includes shoe shelves, they can shift along with your collection.

Most traditional closets leave only two options for storing winter shoes: on the floor, or sitting on the single shelf that sits above your one hanging rod. Both of these places are prime real estate that’s easily reached. However, combining the rotation strategy above with adjustable shoe shelves allows you to store your boots beautifully as close to the ceiling as you can get without laying them down. Because you can adjust the height of each shoe shelf, you can easily shift your collection with the seasons and get those bulkier items out of the way.

Transitioning your household closets into springtime becomes much simpler when you no longer have to deal with vacuum sealing and migrating items from room to room. I, for one, completely credit my custom closets for this change—and that’s why we recommend these strategies to the families that come through our doors at Closet America. Be sure to check with your neighborhood to see if a Fairfax County building permit is required before you jump in—but once that’s taken care of, you’re free to join the rest of us in closet bliss. Sign up for your free design consultation today to learn how the Closet America team can help you transform the way you store seasonal clothing.

Lead image source: Flickr user Elvert Barnes