10 Professional Tips for Designing and Organizing a Small Nursery

Amanda Wiss, founder of Urban Clarity.

First-time expecting parents have a lot to do and prep for before the birth of their child. One of those things is getting a nursery ready, which might seem daunting when living in the city’s tight quarters. Amanda Wiss is the founder of Urban Clarity, a Fort Greene-based team made up of 12 professional organizers who help clients create enjoyable spaces for themselves. She spoke at the 2019 Brooklyn Baby and Family Expo, held on April 11 in Gowanus, and gave her Top 10 tips for designing and organizing a small nursery.

#1. Buy storage-friendly furniture – like a crib with drawers for storing extra diapers and wipes. Furniture pieces can look aesthetically pleasing, but should be functional.

2. Trick out your closet.

“For anyone who has the ability to build, try to add as many shelves to a closet as you possibly can because shelves are the best way to optimize space,” Wiss said. “But if you’re not able to build it out and [you] have just a bar and a shelf, [use] a hanging bag. They’re fantastic for small linens and blankets.”

3. Convert your dresser into a changing table.

4. Opt for a mini-crib or multi-purpose crib if you don’t have the space for a full-sized one.

5. Containerize everything – use clear, stackable bins and label them.

“You’re going to want to separate things by category because when you get to the next season or to the next clothing size, you don’t have to dig through all that stuff,” she added.

6. Go vertical – like hanging a shoe bag on the back of your closet door.

“It doesn’t need to have shoes in it; it should have other things at arm’s reach,” Wiss explained. “It can [store] baby Tylenol and a thermometer, for example, in a top pocket. Start grouping things in your mind based on frequency of use and accessibility.”

Plus, instead of displaying items on dressers and other flat surfaces, you can go vertical with sturdy floating shelves for book storage or to show treasures off.

“It’ll look much more intentional … and your child won’t be able to destroy them, when they’re mobile, [because] the items are high up,” she said.

7. Avoid the glider that can take up a lot of space – you can get a compact chair that swivels instead.

8. Skip the toy bin – when not opened, things are put on top of the bin’s cover; when opened, little toys or pieces fall to the bottom. Bin lids can also close on kids’ hands if they’re reaching for something, Wiss added.

9. Rotate nursery decorations – you don’t need to feel like you have to display all the gifts and photos at the same time.

10. A donation station to manage the inflow and outflow of outgrown clothes via a bin or a bag.

For more information, visit Amanda’s web site: urbanclarity.net.

 

Top photo from Urban Clarity’s website

Share:

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

Comments are closed.

READ OUR FULL PRINT EDITION

Our Sister Publication

a word from our sponsors!

Latest Media Guide!

Where to find the Star-Revue

Instagram

How many have visited our site?

wordpress hit counter

Social Media

Most Popular

On Key

Related Posts

Film: “Union” documents SI union organizers vs. Amazon, by Dante A. Ciampaglia

Our tech-dominated society is generous with its glimpses of dystopia. But there’s something especially chilling about the captive audience meetings in the documentary Union, which screened at the New York Film Festival and is currently playing at IFC Center. Chronicling the fight of the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), led by Chris Smalls, to organize the Amazon fulfillment warehouse in Staten

An ode to the bar at the edge of the world, review by Oscar Fock

It smells like harbor, I thought as I walked out to the end of the pier to which the barge now known as the Waterfront Museum was docked. Unmistakable were they, even for someone like me — maybe particularly for someone like me, who’s always lived far enough from the ocean to never get used to its sensory impressions, but

Quinn on Books: In Search of Lost Time

Review of “Countée Cullen’s Harlem Renaissance,” by Kevin Brown Review by Michael Quinn   “Yet do I marvel at this curious thing: / To make a poet black, and bid him sing!” – Countée Cullen, “Yet Do I Marvel” Come Thanksgiving, thoughts naturally turn to family and the communities that shape us. Kevin Brown’s “Countée Cullen’s Harlem Renaissance” is a

MUSIC: Wiggly Air, by Kurt Gottschalk

Mothers of reinvention. “It’s never too late to be what you might have been,” according to writer George Eliot, who spoke from experience. Born in the UK in 1819, Mary Ann Evans found her audience using the masculine pen name in order to avoid the scrutiny of the patriarchal literati. Reinvention, of style if not self, is in the air