Organizing shoes

In our entryway we have an Ikea BISSA shoes organizer. As a reason we used to have an empty entryway for a couple of years, we decided to buy some pieces of furniture to be pretty and also functional in the entryway, so we decided to buy this pretty shoes organizer as one of those pieces to store our daily worn shoes.

It was kind of organized at the beginning but a while later it started to become messy and jam-packed with flip-flops and shoes. It is a little bit of a shame to show you how it looked before.

To be honest, I don't take care of my shoes enough. Maybe because I don't' go out that much but I keep wearing them until they get a little old and dusty then switch to new pairs. I know how awful this is specially for one who lives in a little bit of dusty atmosphere in Summer like me, but this will be solved someday.

Our shoes storage has three cabinets. We are three in the house so this is convenient. One cabinet for each one of us would be a good solution. You may noticed how the lower cabinet was really messy. My toddler keeps playing around and opens lower cabinets a lot. However it is still a good solution to put his shoes in there because it is very easy for him to get his pair of shoes when I ask him to bring it to go for "bye".

First thing I did to organize our shoes storage is to take off everything in there and make the whole cabinets empty to be ready for clean.

Next, I wiped down the cabinets with a dry rag  then with wet one and finally I gave them a shiny look with furniture care detergent.

I wanted to add cabinets protector on the internal face of the cabinet doors to protect the wood from dust and high heels' scratches, but those white places made for screws preventing a properly set-up for the protector. I could just cut some corners and some squares in the protector to avoid the screws without taking off the cabinet door. But do we accept the good quality here or are we seeking for professionalism and taking a little bit of challenge?

I decided to put the cabinet protector the hard way. First I got the screw driver and took off the cabinet doors.

Did I make it? Sometimes we really need to trust our abilities right?

It was the time to add the protector. I measured, made signs with a pen and cut.

Moving to the fun part. I liked to punch  holes in the protector for the screws. I marked the places of the screws over the protector.

The easiest way to punch for me is to take off the lower lid of the puncher and turn the puncher upside down. I can easily see the marks I did that way.

To add the protector. I just added some double sided tape on the upper edges of the door. I don't want any harm for the wood so the edges were enough. I didn't need any tape in lower edges because the screws will hold the protector in place and also because the lower edges are not that touchable, unlike the top which need to be held when opening the cabinet.

I cut out  the remains of the tape following the edges of the door.

Then carefully added  the protector sheet and hold in place.

It was the time to put the doors back. I have to admit it was not easy to hold the door with one hand and the screw driver  with the other. I recommend get someone to help or something to keep the doors up for you.

This is the result. I really liked the colors. So shiny and pretty.

Back to the shoes. I purged all of them. However each cabinet can carry four pairs which are more than enough for each of us beside the entry door. Rarely worn shoes are kept away in the dressing room. The flip-flops are also kept away. So what we only wear on a daily bases are kept in the organizer.

You also got to see before and after pictures.

I am proud of this project. It looks awesome now. Tell me your opinion in the colors and the process. I like always to hear from you. I adore your comments. See you in the up-coming post.