9 Savvy Storage Ideas for Shoes and Coats
You don’t need to have a dedicated mudroom off a spacious hallway to stash your shoes or coats. Here’s the proof
Hallway always cluttered with shoes and coats? Forever tripping over umbrellas? Constantly picking up coats that have slid off the banister? Live in a neatly proportioned house with no space for a dedicated mudroom? Check out these clever alternatives – then be sure to show yours off, because most visitors won’t even notice it.
2. Build a secret shoe bench
If you have room for a coat rack in a hallway, you have space for a shoe bench beneath it. This contemporary take is deeper than yours needs to be, but the neat, lift-up lids along its length offer bags of easy-to-reach storage for everything from boots to out-of-season coats.
Fuss-free and light-coloured, its lack of visual bulkiness means it doesn’t make the hallway feel narrower.
If you have room for a coat rack in a hallway, you have space for a shoe bench beneath it. This contemporary take is deeper than yours needs to be, but the neat, lift-up lids along its length offer bags of easy-to-reach storage for everything from boots to out-of-season coats.
Fuss-free and light-coloured, its lack of visual bulkiness means it doesn’t make the hallway feel narrower.
3. Hide it in plain sight
Part shoe storage, part whole-house storage system, this handy coat and shoe rack could be in just about any room – from a living space to a bedroom.
The key to making it work? Keep it neat – or add doors – and don’t overload it (so something for singletons or couples rather than large families, perhaps). Painting the shelving and wall behind in a uniform, dark shade helps make it visually recede too.
A Beginner’s Guide to Bespoke Joinery
Part shoe storage, part whole-house storage system, this handy coat and shoe rack could be in just about any room – from a living space to a bedroom.
The key to making it work? Keep it neat – or add doors – and don’t overload it (so something for singletons or couples rather than large families, perhaps). Painting the shelving and wall behind in a uniform, dark shade helps make it visually recede too.
A Beginner’s Guide to Bespoke Joinery
4. Fill a shallow alcove
If your hallway has a return just inside the front door, you can fill the space usefully with a cupboard that’s just bigger than shoe depth (using the largest feet in the house as guidance).
Practical sliding doors painted the colour of the other walls will help it to blend in and make everything easy to get to. Fill one side with shoe shelves, the other with coat hooks.
If your hallway has a return just inside the front door, you can fill the space usefully with a cupboard that’s just bigger than shoe depth (using the largest feet in the house as guidance).
Practical sliding doors painted the colour of the other walls will help it to blend in and make everything easy to get to. Fill one side with shoe shelves, the other with coat hooks.
5. Stash it in an ottoman
If your shoes are more stiletto than stompy boots – and you go from bar to car rather than through the woods with the dog – a living room footstool with storage hidden beneath a lift-up lid is the perfect place to hide away the shoes you like wearing a lot. It’s a great place for scarves, hats, gloves and bags too.
If your shoes are more stiletto than stompy boots – and you go from bar to car rather than through the woods with the dog – a living room footstool with storage hidden beneath a lift-up lid is the perfect place to hide away the shoes you like wearing a lot. It’s a great place for scarves, hats, gloves and bags too.
6. Fit half-depth cabinets
If you think you don’t have room for a shoe and coat cupboard, maybe you just need to rethink its proportions? So, rather than measuring up for one that’s the depth of a coat from shoulder-to-shoulder, consider hanging coats so they face outwards, as in this cupboard, making it little more than boot-depth.
Fit beautiful doors: no one will consider what chaos lies behind them.
How to Make Awkward Kitchen Spaces Functional
If you think you don’t have room for a shoe and coat cupboard, maybe you just need to rethink its proportions? So, rather than measuring up for one that’s the depth of a coat from shoulder-to-shoulder, consider hanging coats so they face outwards, as in this cupboard, making it little more than boot-depth.
Fit beautiful doors: no one will consider what chaos lies behind them.
How to Make Awkward Kitchen Spaces Functional
7. Camouflage yours in furniture
Mudrooms needn’t actually be rooms – yours could be tucked into a cabinet. This one has been built for purpose, and is doorless for easy access. But any cabinet or shelving unit of a similar height and configuration would work – and adding doors would, of course, make the room look neater.
Mudrooms needn’t actually be rooms – yours could be tucked into a cabinet. This one has been built for purpose, and is doorless for easy access. But any cabinet or shelving unit of a similar height and configuration would work – and adding doors would, of course, make the room look neater.
8. Make use of voids
If your house is bursting at the seams and you haven’t a centimetre of storage space left, you need to be creative. Here, a staircase has been customised so that each tread has a shoe drawer beneath it.
If you’re going for something similar, fit the drawers with recessed handles and soft-close fittings, so they shut themselves safely after use.
If your house is bursting at the seams and you haven’t a centimetre of storage space left, you need to be creative. Here, a staircase has been customised so that each tread has a shoe drawer beneath it.
If you’re going for something similar, fit the drawers with recessed handles and soft-close fittings, so they shut themselves safely after use.
9. Go up and over
What’s the betting that somewhere in your home, there’s a section of wall that’s not being fully exploited because there’s something positioned on the floor beneath it? So, just as you would in a bathroom or living space, why not build storage up and over it?
A boxed arrangement with baskets like this one makes access easy – with each family member responsible for their own belongings.
Tell us
Where do you stash shoes and coats in your home? Share your solutions in the Comments section. And if you found this story helpful, like it, bookmark it, save the photos and share your thoughts below. Join the conversation.
More
Read up on more great storage solutions
What’s the betting that somewhere in your home, there’s a section of wall that’s not being fully exploited because there’s something positioned on the floor beneath it? So, just as you would in a bathroom or living space, why not build storage up and over it?
A boxed arrangement with baskets like this one makes access easy – with each family member responsible for their own belongings.
Tell us
Where do you stash shoes and coats in your home? Share your solutions in the Comments section. And if you found this story helpful, like it, bookmark it, save the photos and share your thoughts below. Join the conversation.
More
Read up on more great storage solutions
Many homes have an under-stairs area that’s poorly organised and totally under-used, so why not create dedicated shoe and coat storage beneath yours?
Pull-out shelving and hanging units such as this one are the easiest to access – and if you wallpaper the flush fronts of the units, they’ll be just about unnoticeable when they’re closed, making the hallway feel more spacious.