A graphic of a loft containing organised and labelled boxes making everything easy to find
Episode 53 – Loft (Part 3) organising and zoning

In Part 3 of this 3 part podcast series, Lesley and Ingrid talk about the storage you need when organising your loft and how zoning is so effective.
So many homes have lofts and attics that are filled to the brim with stuff - from appliance boxes to suitcases to memorabilia to kids' toys and hand me downs. You name it, it might just be in your loft. But decluttering your loft can be a daunting task. In this podcast series, we break it down so we think about the emotions involved, the decluttering, storage, loft organising and zoning.
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Transcript of this podcast episode
Intro  0:07  
Welcome to today's episode of The declutter hub podcast, your channel for super easy, no nonsense advice on how to declutter and organise your home. Please welcome your host professional organisers, Ingrid Jansen and Lesley Spellman.

Ingrid  0:22  
Hello, and welcome listeners to Episode 53 of the declutter hub podcast. We're Ingrid and Lesley and we're helping people declutter their homes. Check out members dot declutter hub.com For more information on our step by step online courses, live q&a sessions we do every two weeks, our membership community and checklists and guides. In today's episode, Lesley and I are talking about loved organising. This is a three part series and this is the final part. So in Part Number one, we talked about the emotions and why we store things in lofts. And in Part Number two, we cover the logistics of doing a declutter, and some typical questions you need to ask yourself when looking at loft items. So we're now going to talk about the final push. And to make sure your loft isn't going to get into a muddle again, you're going to need to organise it into a sensible system. And that is going to involve storage boxes, lots of them, and zoning. So how I'm feeling Oh, good, Lesley We talked about decluttering. And now I'm ready to talk about organising. 

Lesley  1:31  
Before we talk about the last kind of just say episode 53 means that we've done we're into our second year of podcasting.

Ingrid  1:40  
I know. I know. I got Yeah, that's true.

Lesley  1:46  
52 weeks of the year. Hello.

Ingrid  1:48  
Oh my gosh, we're like in season two, this is season two, Lesley.

Lesley  1:53  
Oh, no. Episode 53. Wow. 53 episodes of you and me talking and laughing and doing all the things that we do. But anyway, just one just sorry. I was like, 53. That's a whole year's worth of podcasts. Right? Okay, so today we are going to talk about organising and zoning our loss, aren't we? Yeah, definitely a critical bit, isn't it? I'm not gonna lie. This is the one of the critical bits. And it's one of the things that a lot of people miss out, which is really, really important. So it doesn't get into a state again.

Ingrid  2:25  
Yes. Because it's kind of easy to think, oh, you know, I'm feeling very overwhelmed and and I'm going to declutter it. But then to kind of do this last bit and to really make sure you set yourself up really well this time and not kind of okay, I'm just so over done with it. I'm just check some stuff out what I've done with a close to love letter that's done.

Lesley  2:46  
Yeah, exactly. Because you need a system in the same way that you do in the rest of your house. In a system that means that you are going to find things really easily, you're going to find exactly what you need, and you're going to be able to put your hands on it. And it's immediately visible and accessible when you go into your loft.

Ingrid  3:00  
Yeah, definitely. I think it for me, it all kinds of starts with it starts with boxes and crates and things with lids. That's where it starts for me if I'm if I'm thinking about organising a loft, that's where it starts for me. How do you feel about it?

Lesley  3:16  
Exactly. There's gotta be there's got to be lidded boxes, hasn't there? Yeah. Lots of them and met. To be fair, most people have got loads and loads of boxes already. So once you start to declutter, so what you don't need to do is go out and buy loads of boxes before you declutter unless you know that you've got none, in which case, I would strongly recommend it. Yeah. But you need to know that going to the boxes. But a lot of times we can declutter stuff out boxes, create some space in those boxes and put the stuff back in.

Ingrid  3:45  
Yeah. And if you are going to have to buy some boxes, because everything is now living in black bin bags in your loft. I would say choose a certain brands or book solution that you like, and get a bit of the same ones because it's just it stacks better. It's easier. And it looks neater as well. If you use the same kind of books, I think for me, what's important is that they're actually see through. So you don't only have to use a put a label on them. But you can also see what's in them.

Lesley  4:17  
Absolutely the more see through the better. So you can see exactly what's in there really critical. wouldn't necessarily recommend that if you had boxes in other places in your home, because it's nice for you not to see that visual clutter almost through the box. But in a loft. You absolutely need to see it.

Ingrid  4:33  
Yeah. So see through good quality crates with lids, and also very important. If you do have a loft ladder with a hatch, don't buy ones that are too big and then can't fit through your love to hatch, right? You have to really measure that. And also think about the fact the bigger the boxes are, the more stuff fits in it. The heavier they get and it gets really then tricky to move them in and out of back and forth. So have these things in mind. So not too small, she can only fit three things in them, but not too big either. So it's, you really want to get the nice kind of, I think, what 5060 litres are normally like standard ones, isn't that Lesley?

Lesley  5:18  
Yeah, for a lot, that's a good, that's a good sort of sizes, medium size boxes aren't they're fantastic. But obviously different people have got different boxes, different accesses, different loft ladders, different hatch spaces. And so it very much depends. But yeah, the weight is really critical the amount of time you and I have to go off ladders, carrying huge boxes down with heavy weights in them. It's not good, it's unsafe. So definitely be mindful of that.

Ingrid  5:41  
Yeah. And also, it is helpful if you have got Eve so really slopey roof, you really want to get some smaller boxes. So you can kind of slide them into the eat and put the bigger boxes in front of it. So think about what kind of how many you buy of everything, if you need to buy them. But like we said, if you have boxes in your house with proper lids, you don't need to replace everything. But if you're starting from scratch, think about these things. And also make sure that the lid actually attaches properly to the books.

Lesley  6:14  
The ones that clip in are better than the ones that just sit on top, aren't they?

Ingrid  6:17  
Yeah, I mean, I know that there are companies that have really nice boxes, but the lids are loose almost on it. And I think especially if you want to take things down from a lot, it's better to have something with clickable lids. And I really like the books just from the really useful books company, you can have a look on really useful products dot code at UK, we'll put a link in the show notes. They're fantastic boxes, they're a bit more expensive. But I think they will last and last and last. And they're really great.

Lesley  6:45  
I think it is the durability of the really useful boxes that anybody that's got them knows that they are the best boxes probably on the market. If we're truly honest, aren't we, as professional organisers we hear about them time and time again. And that's what we like, yeah. But realistically, you know, you could go down to a cheaper shop and get a box for seven or eight pounds, and it might cost you 20 or 30 to get the same box. So it's not a cheap thing. If you've suddenly got to go out and buy 10 or 15 boxes, which is a distinct possibility in a loft. It's an expensive purchase. Yeah, yeah. So you've got to find that sort of compromise in the middle. But if you can afford it, invest in the boxes and invest in the storage because they'll last for life.

Ingrid  7:24  
Yeah, I think the second thing when you're organising your loft, like you said, See through boxes are great, but you also want to think about your labelling, and label all the boxes. And if you have six boxes with Christmas decorations, you might want to actually be a bit more specific than only put Christmas decorations. And actually maybe put one with lights and the other one for your baubles and the other one for your decorations and the other one for I know the stable if you've got a stable in your house of Christmas, so be a bit more specific, and not keep it too general, if you've got several boxes of the same kinds.

Lesley  8:01  
When you've got several books, can I just talk about something that I absolutely love. So you know, we've talked about the fact that I lived in America for a couple of years. Now storage wise, they are so lucky because they've got a shop called The Container Store in America. And you can get everything beautiful plastic, you know, these fantastic organisational systems, it's like heaven to us go in in the Container Store. And we do not have an equivalent here in terms of the range of stuff that you're getting the Container Store. If you're listening container storage, I'm sure you're not please come to the UK because we'd love you to be here because we want you so you can get some stuff on Amazon we've got a search with much harder than you would in the US. But what I got them when I was there is I did get quite a lot of different boxes specifically for my decorations. And so I've got for my Christmas decorations. I've got red boxes with green LEDs. For my Halloween decorations. I've got orange boxes with black lids. How cool Do you think this looks like you know, they have different coloured boxes for different things. And they're really, really cool. I just had a quick search actually, you can get that kind of thing on Amazon over here as well. And I'm sure there are other places that you can get them from as well. But that takes your zone and your organisation to a whole new level when you're doing decorations and looks amazing. And

Ingrid  9:16  
you also have special storage containers for Christmas trees as well. So you've got the long thin boxes even you've got special, long thin boxes for wrapping paper. So don't think that all the boxes have to be a square or rectangle. I mean there there is there are lots of options out there to make it work for you and make it work for the stuff that you have. But well

Lesley  9:40  
there are specifically ones for bubbles aren't that the bubbles off? I love my wrapping paper boxes and I do store my Christmas and my birthday wrapping paper together in a long box. So those kinds of things really do make a difference because when they meet you know, we know with wrapping paper, there's always one that's too long, that sort of deal isn't there if you've got a standard box, it's too long to fit in there and you're trying to put it in a drawer under a bed or, you know. So it's just nice to have all your wrapping paper together. Because if it's together, what that means is you don't overbuy as well. So it's things like that that are really, really critical. So it's worth spending some time actually looking at the type of boxes that are available. Because once you've got those kinds of things, it really really does help.

Ingrid  10:21  
Oh, Lesley, by the way, I wanted to add something else about the labelling, I forgot to mention that earlier, we talked about labels and labelling your boxes. But I think it's also really important that you use maybe a bit bigger labels. So it's really good to of course, label your boxes. And if you've got several boxes of the same thing to label what's in it, but also use labels that are a bit larger, so you can see them better. And if you've got a chance also to label maybe the top and the side and the front. So if you happen to put your books back in a different way that you're not immediately used to visibility of what's in there.

Lesley  10:59  
Definitely no, that's a really good idea. You could choose a standard label, can't you and that sort of standard stick on label and a Sharpie. To mark it up, try using a sharpie rather than a by arrow in the lot that you can visibly see, it's all about being able to maybe put your head up on the loft ladder and be able to scan around the lot and see what you need to isn't it? Yeah, visibility is compromised isn't enough because of the sort of dim lighting and lack of light and if that makes sense. And so that's why labels need to be different up there.

Ingrid  11:27  
Yeah, I think the big no, no, for lofts must be plastic bags, because they really start to disintegrate if you haven't used them in years. And this other kind of almost pulverise. It's a very sad sight. So if you can avoid plastic bags, also for visibility, but also because the plastic bags just crumble apart if they haven't been touched for years and years.

Lesley  11:51  
And that is a mess, isn't it? Yeah. And anybody who's seen those those degraded disintegrated plastic bags knows exactly what we're talking about that is a job and a half to sort that out, isn't it?

Ingrid  12:02  
Yeah. And you clog up your home for it as well.

Lesley  12:05  
Yeah, and I think it's important as well actually, if you've got the opportunity to and you've not got a very, very sloping roof, you might be able to put some racking up in your loft. So it doesn't need to be crazily expensive rack and you can buy quite cheap racking that you can just sort of slot together, it doesn't even need screws and things. And that's quite useful some time. So you can put the boxes so they don't need to stack and you don't need to pull them down every time just to sort of split them up a little bit. So racking works really well in a lot as well, if you can fit it up there. But normally, obviously you've got to build it up there as well.

Ingrid  12:37  
Yeah, I think also, I wanted to give the top tip to our listeners. If you have decided on a kind of a massive loft declutter and you've taken everything down and you've sorted it all out. Maybe this is an opportunity for you as well to go, I'm going to board my loft, I'm going to put a proper lighting I'm going to make create an electricity point. So if you've actually decided, everything needs to come down, because I'm going to do it really from scratch and I'm going to do it properly, then this is the time you want to make that decision. You don't want to put everything back in your loft and then decide I should have gotten it boarded or I should have put in the lighting or gosh and electricity point would have been really handy to have made to think about that.

Lesley  13:22  
I mean, to be fair, Ingrid. That was the time when most people do do a lot declutter when they're having their loft board. It's just like the way around almost isn't it? I need to get my loft down and put some lights up there. So I'm going to declutter it while I'm doing that. So it's kind of a What came first the chicken or an egg really, isn't it? Yeah, true.

Ingrid  13:40  
True. So we've got it all decluttered we've got an all in nice boxes. It's all going back. Let's talk about zoning them.

Lesley  13:49  
Love a zone in don't you in a loft?

Ingrid  13:51  
I do. I do. I like I like creating little corners where stuff lives.

Lesley  13:59  
Now and it's so nice to be able to tell this is where this Sony is and this is this other thing, but I think that's where a lot of people fall short when they are organising because it's not. So don't just think about it as another room in your house. You know, in the same way that you would you put your stationery here or you put your glasses here or your you know, it's exactly the same principle but obviously it's bigger, much bigger categories. So what kinds of things do we need to zone obviously it's different for different people, depending on whether you do sport depending on whether you come whether your ski, whether you've got houses that you rent out makes a difference. No people are keeping furniture, things like that, whether you've got your own business, all these things have got an impact in the kind of zones that you might need. So let's just talk about a few of the ones that you might need. They're very, very typical, very common ones.

Ingrid  14:45  
Well, definitely, I would make create the zone where all your holiday decorations live together. So it's just so you've got a whole area on your loft. This is where I need to look if I need to have how When Christmas Easter or whatever decoration it is, this is where I'm looking at. So you don't need to kind of scavenge through the whole loft and wonder where everything is, I think that that's one of the most found items in the loft is actually holiday decorations.

Lesley  15:14  
But it's really important for you to think about if you've got the space to do so to actually split those up. So they're not all in front of the other. So if you've got if you can put them all in a line almost now. So you've got Christmas, if you do Christmas, Easter, Eid, Hanukkah Halloween is you know, all those different kinds of holidays that we've got. Because sometimes it can be difficult if we've got to fight through all of the Christmas decorations to get to the Halloween ones, because it's now October, you know, that kind of thing. So when you put some Christmas decorations or holiday deco decorations away, think about what the next celebration is going to be and what you're going to need next, when you're putting things away. Yeah,

Ingrid  15:51  
good point. I think the same goes for clothes, almost, if you've got close up in your loft, maybe for kids to grow into, you don't want to have the next size below six or seven boxes of other sizes that are larger. So if you can order them in in a sensible way. So the next size is the easiest to grab box, basically.

Lesley  16:16  
Yeah. So when you are organising kids clothes, if you've got lots and lots of Hami downs. So you're talking about actually boxing those and put them in age categories. So kind of by seven to nine or you know, things like that, because obviously there's a fluctuation and you know, some kids are seven, and they get into nine year olds clubs and vice versa. So let's not make it too small of a category. Yeah. But let's kind of look at that and think about how we're going to categorise those together so that they can be easily accessible. You shouldn't really have one for every age group. Otherwise, you are going to be completely inundated only with clothes. So two or three years where it's probably a good a good place to start.

Ingrid  16:56  
Yeah, yeah. And I think also suitcases you want to have all together. So if you are going on a trip, you don't have to kind of look through the whole lofts and get them from all different kinds of places. You want to have them all together. And maybe you have decided because of lack of space, you're going to have to put some smaller suitcases into bigger suitcases, but at least make sure you put them all together. And I think also you want to have the items you use more frequently closer to ease your access and stuff you only don't You don't use a lot can live further down in the loft as well.

Lesley  17:37  
Yeah, definitely, I think it's a really good idea to put smaller suitcases inside of larger ones to save on space. It just looks neater anyway, doesn't it? Certainly hold us inside of suitcases. But make sure you know, and somehow you label up which suitcase has got all the whole doors in it. Also, I

Ingrid  17:53  
think like you already mentioned sports equipment, or camping or skiing, you want that stuff to lift to get it especially if when when you go skiing with kids and they're growing and you need to kind of make sure that you keep all the clothes in circulation and that you don't kind of miss out the whole age group. Keep that all together in a box or in a crate. And that's probably something you probably have to take down every time you go skiing and go through it and see what the still fit and what doesn't fit. And immediately take out any clothes that no longer fit your child. So it can go to the charity shop or be given to someone other family who ski as well.

Lesley  18:33  
And they will definitely you know when you are levelling up and think it's a really good idea with certainly with skin equipment, it's a really good idea to label exactly what it is what age it is, and what it is. But don't put Nathan in it because it might not be Nathan's next time you go skiing. Yeah, so just put, you know, by if it has to be a boy one, age seven, or whatever that might be that's kind of useful. And then even if people because a lot of times, you know, people don't go skiing every year, but they might go to where we've got a place up here called the chill factor, like a sort of indoor ski area. And they might be looking to borrow ski stuff just to go for a one off once a year. And and that's the kind of thing where you are happy to do that. Aren't you happy to sort of pass things on because it's an expensive thing to actually get ski gear. So I think that is things that people lend out quite a lot, isn't it? Yeah,

Ingrid  19:20  
I'm also thinking about paperwork, and archival paperwork, you really want to use smaller boxes. So if you're going to store paperwork in your loft, use smaller boxes don't use bigger boxes because they just get too heavy and just too much gets into his boxes. So use smaller boxes. If you want to sort some paperwork or maybe if you want to do photos, maybe you can organise per decade or per family or preferably member there's loads of different ways to how to organise it. But think about smaller books just for heavy items like if you if you are going to store some books which Don't recommend but if you smaller boxes again, because paper is heavy.

Lesley  20:05  
And I think again talking about paperwork archives, really ask yourself, should it be there in the first place? Yeah, the only thing that I believe should be up there paperwork archival it is if you have got some kind of business or some kind of tax reasons why you need to store things archivally those are the kinds of things that should be should be up there. But don't keep domestic paperwork that you don't need, it shouldn't even find its way up to loft in the first place. Because it's never going to come back down. And even the stuff that's archival, but for tax reasons, that's never really going to get locked out. And like you're only keeping it in case you get a tax inspection of some kind. So that's probably never gonna get looked at either. So yeah, be really careful. Don't stick loads and loads of paperwork up in the loft.

Ingrid  20:47  
Another area you might create is in household area. Where you, I don't know, I've got I don't think I've got anything from a household in my loft. I don't think I either declutter it, or I use it. But I know people will have household items, but put them together as well. Yeah,

Lesley  21:05  
well, what what kinds of things going household? I mean, the kinds of things you know, we talked before about keeping things for your kids and stuff like that. Now, there are some things potentially, that your kids might want. So a small number of household things might be quite useful. Or it might be something that you buy, some people will buy things in advance, if they see something on sale, they might buy a kettle, for example, waiting for the other one to break down that they suddenly put a new one in the loft. It's those kinds of things, potentially, that might go up there. And there's the kind of household bits and bobs that tend to find the way there. I think so yeah, it's good to have a hat, you'll always have a household section, I think somewhere that was something in there weren't there?

Ingrid  21:44  
Yeah, I think I'm blessed with quite a large kitchen, I've got quite a large amount of cabinets, cabinets in my kitchen. So maybe that's why nothing lifts up in my life, because I'm lucky enough to be able to store it downstairs, I think. I think the last very big zone in a loft is memory boxes.

Lesley  22:01  
Yeah, we've spoken about this in both of the other podcasts, I think as well, you know, a loft absolutely is the place for sentimental items. But it's just keeping it real and keeping it sensible. And making sure that every now and again, you're gonna go through those memory boxes and take stuff out that you no longer feel is sentimental. And it ups there absolutely will be things in there. My daughter's coming back from a holiday soon. And I'm going to ask her to go through her sentimental stuff, because I know that half of it now, with the passage of time, she's just not going to feel is that special anymore. And so I just think it's important to just keep tabs on that and go through those memory boxes. Because once they're up in the loft, they might be up there for decades mountain before the get looked at.

Ingrid  22:45  
Yeah, very, very true. What now, if you have a love that is, has quite a lot of zones going on, what might be helpful, if you're ending, if you're nearing the end of your decluttering and organising project is to make a little bit of a map to create a map of your loft and go and just so you can stick it maybe on your loft door or maybe on the top, maybe laminated if you think okay, I want to make sure that it stays next to my loft ladder at the top of the loft ladder. Make a little map this is where the Christmas decorations lives. This is what a sports equipment, here's where the memory boxes are. So not only you but also other people are able to find items in the loft.

Lesley  23:30  
Yeah, exactly any good organisational system should be able to be used by other people. So we don't create systems just for ourselves. We create systems that in an emergency, I mean, not in this situation. But save like a paperwork system. For example, if there was an emergency and you ended up going into hospital for two months, and someone needed to take over that paperwork system that they could do that. And the same with with zoning law, you don't want to be the one that always has to go and put the stuff away in the loft. You want other family members to be able to do that. And we want you know, particularly with our kids were like Classica don't know where it goes, you know, I mean, and then Where's it go? And then they just dump it down? Well, they've got no excusive it's all labelled up and zoned and those those zoned maps are brilliant for that.

Ingrid  24:12  
Yeah, maybe you even want to go completely crazy and go colour coordinate your your your maybe you want to have boxes with different lids in different colours. I mean you can make it as fancy and wonderful as you want to. My thing is start with C three boxes and a proper leads. But if you want to go all out on beautiful labels and have fantastic maps and colour coordinated and do all of that go all out. But you don't

Lesley  24:42  
know exactly. It's just about having a system really and how fancy you make that look system is then down to you and it's down to your choices and your preferences and your budget, isn't it so we can all make lofts look fantastic. But actually sometimes we just need to work with what we've got. And that might be cardboard if we can't afford plastic boxes. Yeah, but as long as it's labelled, as long as it's sturdy, ideally, if it's stackable, those are the kinds of things that we're looking at in a loft.

Ingrid  25:07  
Yeah. I love my decluttered and organised loft. I have a good feeling. I'm feeling organised now, Lesley.

Lesley  25:15  
Yeah. Can I just say actually, you posted a picture the other day of a cupboard in your house. What was that? What was that's like a client's cupboard, you're supposed to be a professional organiser.

Ingrid  25:27  
It was actually, it hadn't had never looked worse than that day because I actually declutter the printer from my house, and it was ready to go to be brought to the charity shop. And then I've been decluttering some other bits around the house. So that all ended up in there as well. And it just kind of got a bit out of control. And then I thought, You know what I've been meaning to get this some shelving in here for like ages and ages. And I tried the other shelving I had in my house, but it was too big. So I needed to see if I can actually find a smaller size shelving. But because I really liked that and I finally got around to going to the local DIY store and actually find out that it didn't have it so I had to go to another one. And then I found to have a smaller size shelving and it were really because my Hoover is in that cupboard as well. So I couldn't get this massive shelving in there because then my Hoover wouldn't fit in there. Just a tiny cupboard. And yeah,

Lesley  26:19  
you make excuses you actually posted. If you want to see it listeners, you go onto our declutter hub community and take a look back through the archives and you'll see Ingrid's embarrassing cupboards I'm embarrassed to be her business partner. You know what,

Ingrid  26:37  
I don't care I you know what it is just not about perfection Lesley. It's about getting there doing it, shorting it out and getting actually got some nice boxes as well. So it looks even nicer. But yeah, hey, how we're all people, you know, one messy cupboard in my house. I'm allowed.

Lesley  26:57  
Okay, fair enough. Fair enough.

Ingrid  27:00  
Well, listeners, this is it for you know what season season two, Episode 53. And it ends with Lesley telling me off from one the one messy cover that I have. This is not good. This is not good. I will. I will. I will tell her off after the show. It's all part of it. It's all part of it. Lovely, lovely listeners. And we love that you listen to our podcasts and we're so grateful you're here. And that's it for this episode. So we hope you all enjoy this episode as we do as well talking to you every week on the podcast. We absolutely love it. And if you want to know more, we're on social media. We're like on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, we've got a lovely group, Lesley mentioned it the declutter hub community. So come and check us out. And don't forget that we now also have a spanking new membership. We are now offering step by step online courses. We're doing live q&a sessions, and we have a membership community. So have a look on members dot declutter hub.com for more information. If you don't want to miss the next episode of this podcast, make sure you go to Apple podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher and it will pop into your notifications each Friday. See you next time.

Outro  28:15  
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