Just over a year after the release of her wave-making first book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, Marie Kondo has returned with even more phenomenal organizational tips. While her first effort focuses on letting go of possessions that don’t bring you joy, her second, Spark Joy: An Illustrated Master Class on The Art of Organizing and Tidying Up, provides storage guidelines for the stuff you’ve decided to keep. The following are some of Kondo’s best tips for organizing some of your home’s worst clutter culprits.
Socks and tights. For an organized drawer, Kondo suggests folding your socks, tights and undergarments into small squares and placing them in a box. This makes it easy to find what you’re looking for (and looks neat, too). She also urges readers to get rid of holey socks and pilled tights before they embark on any folding adventures.
Illustration, Masako Inoue.
Plastic bags. According to Kondo, they’re “one of the most common things people accumulate without thinking.” She suggests folding them and storing them upright in a rigid container — a small box, about half the size of a tissue box, she says, to prevent over-accumulation. This method of storage can also be applied to cloth bags.
Illustration, Masako Inoue.
Bathroom cupboards. Don’t you wish your bathroom storage looked like the cute little illustration below? The key, Kondo says, is to “store by category and store upright.” She suggests placing toilet paper in a box on a shelf above the toilet (if you have one). Purge any expired items and donate the ones you just don’t use anymore. Once you have a designated place for similar items, deciding what to toss will become easier.
Illustration, Masako Inoue.
Towels. Like plastic bags, Kondo suggests storing towels upright in your bathroom cupboard — or a closet if you don’t have room. Storing them this way allows you to keep track of how many you have.
Illustration, Masako Inoue.
Spark Joy, $25, Penguin Random House.
All photos excerpted from Spark Joy: An Illustrated Master Class on the Art of Organizing and Tidying Up. Copyright © 2016 by Marie Kondo Illustrations copyright © 2012, 2015 by Masako Inoue. Published in the United States by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. All rights reserved.
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