Clever Hacks HGTV Stars Swear By To Transform A Basic Closet

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There is never enough room in our closets! This is why we're in love with these clever hacks HGTV stars swear by to transform a basic closet. Whether it's the hall closet bursting with coats, the linen closet you can't fit the winter duvet into, or even your kid's closet — our favorite designers have an easy fix for whatever you're facing. These hacks make these tough spaces easier to navigate, so you never have to do a scavenger hunt to get dressed each morning or be crushed under a pile of stuff. They also teach you how to make the most of what can often be a cramped room and without needing to do any major construction, too.

Because of the ease of use, the majority of these tips are feasible for renters or those newer to DIYs, as well. Better yet, many of these hacks use affordable items you might already have at home, proving that a smart, stylish closet doesn't have to come with a hefty price tag. With just a few tweaks, you'll feel like you've gained a whole new room and maybe even a few extra minutes each morning.

Not having enough closet space is such a common problem, but luckily, Lyndsay Lamb has the perfect solution: "My shoe spinner," she told HGTV, per YouTube, when talking about the things she loves about her closet. It's floor-to-ceiling with plenty of slots for each pair of shoes, plus a mirror on one side as well, so you can check outfits. "Just so I can keep all my shoes up and I know where everything is," she continued. Lamb loves this storage solution so much that she has also installed them in client homes, too.

This shoe spinner is such an ideal way to maximize space, because shoes can take up the entirety of your closet floor if you are not careful. And even then, you only have one layer, per se, of physical space. If you start stacking shoes without a container, you won't be able to properly see your inventory. This is the same if you keep them in their original boxes, too (or even clear bins)! You have to undo and open several layers to select a pair. The spinner solves this problem, because it opens to the front. The Maotifeys Rotating Shoe Rack Tower is a great option for closets that have the room. If you like the idea, but don't have room, try the Amazon Basics 24 Medium Pocket Over-the-Door Hanging Shoe Organizer — it's the same idea, only a touch smaller.

Closet doors might seem essential, but designer Jasmine Roth shows that sometimes, taking them off is the real space-saver. In the nursery featured on the "Four Weeks Until Baby" episode of "Help! I Wrecked My House," Roth removed the closet doors entirely. "If I can put a little bit of pattern in there, maybe some color, I think it's going to make it stand out," Roth said in the episode, per HGTV. Without swinging doors in the way, she was able to place a full changing station, including a dresser, right inside the former closet's footprint. This small shift did more than just effortlessly open up space. It also helped to better integrate the closet into the room's design and daily function.

If you choose to do this in your own home, you can also include open shelving in the niche, which will turn what would've been closed storage into part of the play area. It will then have easy-to-reach items, so it's quicker to swap out toys for playtime. Plus, the matching storage baskets, like the BALEINE 4 Pack Fabric Storage Bins, can make the corner look thoughtfully put together, while keeping everything needed within easy reach. If the storage containers are opaque like these, things still won't look visually cluttered, either — even with the missing doors. This is also a great place to store items that are aesthetically pleasing and can actually add to the visual interest of the room. 

Designer Christina Haack often embraces clever, low-effort solutions to maximize small spaces, like removing closet doors to create open shelving. In a nursery project she shared on Instagram, she transformed a standard closet into an airy alcove simply by taking the doors off, keeping the original shelving intact, but giving the room a lighter, more open feel. Unlike a full closet makeover, this trick can easily transform a basic space in no time, because it's still being used as a traditional closet. This can be a handy idea if closet doors are getting in the way of your room layout. In this particular example, the clearance needed for the closet doors to swing open would likely interfere with the crib placement, or at the very least, create an awkward flow. So, removing them allowed for more flexibility in furnishing the room without sacrificing any storage.

Next, the open shelving makes the nursery feel less boxed-in. This is especially important in a smaller space where every inch counts. To make the open shelving feel intentional, Haack styled with toys, uniform baskets, and neatly arranged essentials. To recreate the look at home, after removing the door, install a set of BAYKA Floating Shelves in the closet. They come in three different colors, so you can easily match them to any decor style.

Your closet's exterior doors don't have to be boring. In fact, when giving a tour of her own home in Los Angeles, Leanne Ford proved that the spot can be a great way to show off your personality. She attached an upcycled pair of window doors onto a sliding barn door to give her closet a unique touch. "So we found these gorgeous old window doors, and we used them here," she told HGTV, per YouTube. "But because there was no room, we put them on the barn slide." This way, the doors didn't open out, taking up valuable space in a smaller room. The slide function makes the most of the square feet available.

Yet, they didn't come ready to install. "I just painted those," Ford continued. "I wanted them to totally blend in. So I used a really warm, white paint. And for that, I wanted it to feel kind of vintage, antiquey, and match the cabin. I love white in all shades, but bright white would have been too modern in here." This creative upcycling idea totally transformed her closet. To do the same at home, you can easily change a barn door of your own into a sliding door with the HOMCOM Sliding Barn Door Hardware Kit. Next, for the doors themselves, the ARKHJEM Glass Sliding Barn Door Sturdy Barn Door Slabs already have the frosted glass built in.

One of Nate Berkus' favorite projects was renovating his 515-square-foot apartment in Manhattan. He really had to get creative about maximizing space without sacrificing style! "I put the television in the closet in the main room so that I wouldn't have to look at the TV," he said on Instagram. He needed a TV, but didn't have a lot of space and didn't want to have it out all the time. Turning a closet into a hidden TV spot is a simple and handy fix for people with limited space. It helps keep the room looking neat and tidy, and it makes it easy to change the room's purpose: A living area during the day and a media room at night.

If you are living in a dorm room, studio apartment, or just have a shallow closet you don't know what to do with, this could be the perfect solution for you. It works best on wide, shallow closets, so you can still see the TV. To make it happen, install a swivel wall mount inside the closet for flexible viewing from all angles, like the Mounting Dream TV Wall Mount or the Perlegear Universal Swivel TV Stand if you can't attach anything to the wall. Next, there is unlikely to be a power source inside the closet, so you'll need to conceal the cords as they run out of the space with a Delamu Cord Hider.

The closet under the stairs is both a blessing and a curse for many. Because they are so deep, it means you can typically store a lot of things in them. But this same deepness, plus the awkward slope of the ceiling above it, means that you also can't get to the things in the back without pulling everything in front of it out, which can be annoying. This setup also makes it harder to keep track of everything inside the closet. On Season 4, Episode 7 of "Fixer to Fabulous," the Marrses fixed this issue with a few tiny tweaks.

Instead of having the under-stairs closet be a long tunnel, they chopped it up into columns of shelves that pull out on wheels instead. The units glide out by pulling on external hardware, kind of like a mega-size filing cabinet. "You got a lot of closet space," Dave said, per YouTube. "And it goes away clean, still," Jenny added. To make the most of the taller height of the ceiling near the top of the stairs, the couple kept traditional closets up there. The shelves began when the slant became more severe. While you might need to hire a contractor for this project, it's certainly a great use of limited space, making the entire closet more accessible and functional to boot.

If your closet is chaotic, Nate Berkus has the perfect solution: labels. He even uses it himself, so you know it's expert-approved. "Just in keeping with my love of the label maker, and my love of organization," Berkus said in an Instagram reel. "I just want you guys to see." The designer then showed the trick to keeping each drawer labeled properly. Do it on the inside of the drawer, not the outside, as to not disrupt the aesthetic flow of the room. This is a great idea to not only stay organized, but also not ruin the chic look of any built-ins you might have.

If, however, you need to organize your space on the outside, be careful about how you use your label maker, like the Nelko Label Maker Machine with Tape. "My cabinets were organized, but not every container matched," Berkus told Domino when discussing a former closet. "Everything was labeled, but I labeled things in the wrong place and the font was too small." While Berkus fixed this problem with the help of professional organizers, you can do the same by just planning ahead. Buy containers in bulk, so they all match! It's easier to return a few than needing to order more down the line. Plus, think carefully about the font size and placement before committing. Uniformity is key.

In Episode 8 of Season 2 of her hit show, Jenn Todryk was faced with a real challenge. Her client's closet was almost unusable. "I think my biggest challenge here, honestly, is how creative can I get with a closet as far as 'design,'" she said, per HGTV. When sizing up the space, she determined that the issues her client was facing are likely very common among her viewers, too. They simply aren't tall enough to reach the top bits of shelving easily, which makes it functionally useless for everyday life.

The solution to this problem came in two parts. First, deciding how to make the best use of the space, so it wasn't totally wasted. "They do not use the top shelving at all," Todryk said. "So let's put in more long shelves, and that way, they can store seasonal products and more shoes." By putting things that her clients would only need on occasion, she saved them the daily or weekly hassle of searching for them. Next, she made it overall more accessible when by adding a ladder to create a functional closet. "I want there to be a ladder with a fancy railing system," she said. To recreate this at home, you can install a permanent system from Stairway Shop. For a less expensive, non-permanent option, try the Taranta 2-Step Ladder, which is a touch more stylish than a metal or plastic step stool.

Hilary Farr has been known to change up the closet organization in plenty of episodes of "Love It or List It." After all, additions easily transform cluttered closets, making it easier to convince a client to stay in their current home. On a recent episode of the show, the designer made a point of redesigning a closet to have shorter shelves. These are far more practical and functional than deep or overly tall ones. They make it easier to see and access everything without having to dig through piles or reach awkwardly into the back. Plus, taller shelves often lead to teetering stacks of clothes or linens that are unstable and frustrating to manage, while shorter shelves naturally limit the height of these piles.

This setup is especially helpful in builder-grade closets, which often come with a few deep shelves that look good, but don't work well in daily use. Swapping them out or retrofitting with more, shorter shelves can dramatically improve functionality without a major renovation. Plus, shorter shelves make better use of vertical space, letting you add additional storage in areas that would otherwise go unused! To recreate this at home, the BOAXEL shelving unit from IKEA is a great place to start for ease of DIY, while the LANTEFUL Tall Shoe Rack works well as a freestanding option.

Mirrors are a great way to make a small space seem bigger, and according to Jasmine Roth, a closet door is a perfect place to have one! "Closet doors are kind of a necessary part of a closet," Roth joked while working on the project during Season 2 of "Help! I Wrecked My House," per HGTV. "But I don't want to just throw up closet doors and call it a day." Instead, she gives the basic doors a stunning upgrade by adding panes of glass.

It's an easy DIY project. Roth advises that you need to measure first, to make sure the mirror is centered, then glue it on. Use a sturdy glue, like Loctite Power Grab Heavy Duty Construction Adhesive to avoid the potential of the glass falling and shattering. For the mirror, consider this Room Essentials Framed Door Mirror which comes in multiple colors, making it easy to match to any space. This QEEYON Wall Mirror is frameless, if you prefer that look, while you can also always add a frame later with something like LaRolls Wall Molding Trim & Chair Rail.