Easy Storage Tutorial

One of the shocks of getting an apartment in Germany was the fact that they come bare. I mean really bare. No light fixtures, no closets, no storage of any kind. It was funny to compare to some friends of ours back in the states who had just gotten an apartment there and said they had a closet in every single room...that's five closets. Some apartments in Germany don't even come with kitchens, luckily we found one with a built in. I'm still trying to find a suitable cabinet to use as a pantry.

Because of that I have gotten creative with storage. Our closets are made from bookshelves from Ikea and a home-made hanging rack that is attached to the book cases. Believe it or not, even though the apartments come without this stuff, they are really expensive. So we improvised.

My family found the easiest way to ship stuff to us (both our things and Oreos, which are also way expensive here), was with flat-rate boxes. I think at one point I had about ten of these empty boxes sitting around. So I got some wrapping paper and wrapped a few of them up and made myself some drawers.

You don't really have to make the inside pretty because there'll be stuff inside covering that up. But I covered the inside so at least there's not nasty brown sticking through.

Simple and easy, as well as re-using something that I just would have recycled anyways.

They fit perfectly in this bookcase from Ikea. So it sits in my office. It's the perfect height for a working table too. Now I just need a desk.