Dorm-It Challenge 1 - Organizing Accessories



Over-the-Door Dorm-It!

Thanks to the wonderful world of Twitter, I connected with @OffTheFloorEZ and as a blogger was given the opportunity to sample a new organizing product called Off-the-Floor EZ Store Dorm-It!  I said okay because I love testing stuff!  Back in my IT days I was the known as “the break-it girl” who could find all the bugs and security/info problems with software updates.  Why was that my nickname?  Because I would not only do the test to verify it did what is was supposed to do, I also tried to find out what else it might let me do – right or wrong!

First, let us discuss the normal set-up with a kit put all together.   I put up both panels and used it as accessory storage since I have posted on various ways to store these things in the past. After I put it up, I hung scarves and beads from the hooks.  I used the storage shelves to hold bangle and stretch bracelets, as well as some hair accessories.  I put additional scarves in the large lidded bin on the bottom.  Looked good, just needed a few more bins to make it work like I wanted.  I can order more of those on their accessory page. 

Note: if you want this set-up to be only for fashion jewelry, instead of draping scarves, get 2 yards of mesh rom a fabric store to drape across hooks and secure with a knot or pin under each hook.  Hang brooches on the middle drape portion and put pierced earrings thru fine mesh (or get bigger mesh for clips) hanging down sides.  To select earrings later, simply pull out fabric on side drapes to see collection and find the ones you want.

What I liked best about the over-the-door product was that I was not putting holes in anything!  So that makes it great for dorm rooms and rental situations.  For home owners, I say decide which works best for you: over-the-door or mounted to the wall before ordering.  Either way, look for your personal “best option” to get stuff off-the-floor or work surface!

My tips for building product based on what I learned:

1. Read the instructions for your product carefully.  When they say do something to snap items in place – do it their way!  When they say push down on back shelf corners - that is what you got to do.  It would not go in securely any other way.
2. If you are hanging this on a door, get someone to help by holding the door still, so that it is not trying to swing close while you are trying to hang it onto the door.  Also, you want to consider if items on inside of door might prevent you from opening the door all the way to the wall.  In my example, I needed to move hooks closer to knob because those near hinges kept inside of door from going back as widely as I desired. 
3. After you have panels together, turn it over and plan your layout by putting items in place without snapping them in because once they are snapped on they are VERY hard to get back off.  After you have decided what configuration works best for you, you might want to make a slight mark just below where the top of each item would go.  Or you could put a sticker or piece of tape right where the top of item should be and then peel off after it is all together.

Please note that I pointed out accessory removal problem to vendor I was told, “In designing this product, much thought was put into a child’s safety. The shelves, bin, and hooks were designed to fit securely onto the panels to prevent them from coming off and crushing some precious toes. And should the layout of the accessories need to change, an older teenager or adult would simply karate-chop from the bottom or base to remove accessories from panel.”

Come back for my next post to see what non-traditional set-ups I did with the Dorm-It!