This is one little home project that’s been on my radar for a long time.

Try as we did, we could never keep the hallway closet, basically a little nook tucked away behind the front door, organized and presentable.

Not until we turned it into a tidy Mud Room that is, complete with designated areas for keys, each person’s face masks and a simple hand sanitizer station.

So if you like a good before and after story, settle in, because this one’s for you.

The Backstory

You might recognize and even identify with this sorry situation.

Your hallway closet is the landing zone for your family’s everything, from coats, jackets and shoes to the dog’s lead, school backpacks, shin guards and random objects that get hurled in there anyway.

We even had a leaf from the dining table tucked in against the back wall.

Does this ring a bell?

How can such a little area get so cluttered and disorganized, where stray shoes are legion? Every so often I’d reorganize and tidy it, from the top to the bottom. 

Done and dusted.

But invariably, the clutter crept back in again, one pair of shoes piling atop another, jackets spilling off hangers or just thrown in on top of the mounting hill of shoes and boots.

Running out the door at the last minute could turn annoying very quickly, as matching shoes were swallowed up in this abyss, otherwise known as our hallway closet.

Throw in COVID and the scramble to find a mask before leaving the house or organizing everyone’s mask so it could always be found in one place and you get the picture.

So we’d close the door on this mess, out of sight out of mind, right?

But it was never really out of mind.

It was always a lingering to-do, an invisible mental chyron or ticker tape running across my forehead that read: I must clean up that closet … what if anybody opened up that door and glanced in? … It’s embarrassing … but at least I can close the door on it.

And so it went.

The Transformation

Until one day I’d had enough of tackling the mess. I literally took the door off its hinges and carried it out to the garage.

That’s the day our little cozy Mud Room started its charmed life.

Ah, the mental solace of knowing this would be a little room that could bring joy instead of a mental cringe, every time I passed by.

And this rejuvenated area continues to bring harmony every day by continuing to bring the tidy.

So after the door came off, it took me an afternoon to sort through the jumbled chaos.

Shoes and jackets got sorted, one pile for donation, while infrequently used shoes and jackets went to everyone’s respective bedroom closets.

The Design

I basically knew what I wanted this new Mud Room to look like so I sketched out a rough design and we set about bringing it to life.

Each person would have their own shoe cubby with a basket, where they could store maybe two or three sets of shoes.

Because we live in Florida, we wear jackets so infrequently that we could store these light jackets in overhead bins. I hung up our heavier winter coats and jackets in our bedroom closets.

I included a little seating area in the design so we could sit down while putting on our shoes.

Once I had pulled everything out of the closet and decided where it was going, I painted the walls gray, using leftover paint from the living and dining rooms.

I painted part of the back wall white to make the built-in seating area look like a hallway stand.

Materials Used

Here are the materials we used, cut to size for our tiny closet. They can be found at any home improvement store.

• Three 1″ x 3″ x 8′ pine boards for the vertical slats. We cut them into five, 3′ pieces. We used Power Grab construction adhesive to attach them to the wall. They’re not load-bearing, just decorative.
• We used a 1′ x 6′ x 8′ pine board to frame out the top and bottom of these vertical pieces of wood. These boards were drilled into the wall studs.
• The top shelf was cut to size and placed atop the 1″ x 6″ frame, secured by nailing it in. We used 5/8-inch thick plywood for the top shelf and seat below.
• The shoe shelves are made out of 3/8-inch thick plywood, which was cut to size to make four cubbies. They’re secured to the wall with 1″-L brackets.
• We placed the jacket hooks in the facing 1″ x 6″ wood frame.

The final touches included the wall-mounted metal storage organizer for the hand sanitizer station and mask hooks, the Mud Room sign and the decorative letters spelling out HOME.

I already had the string lights, which come in handy, since we haven’t gotten around to installing a light in there yet.

All I can say is it never gets old passing by and appreciating the tidy! 

Plus, we now have a central area to set down our masks and keys. I think a big ole “Yay!” is in order!