Closet Planner

How to use it

1. Measure the closet. Measure the wall width at the floor, the middle and near the ceiling and enter the smallest; walls are rarely parallel. Add the ceiling height and the depth from the back wall to the front of the closet.
2. Say how you'll build it. Unit height is the floor to the top of the top shelf; 84 in. leaves a foot for bins above a standard 8 ft ceiling. Enter the thickness you measure, not the label: plywood sold as 3/4 in. is often 23/32 in. Choose whether fixed shelves are screwed between the panels or set in dados.
3. Add sections from left to right. Each width is the clear opening between two panels. Neighbors share a panel, so the run is the openings plus one more panel than there are sections. The line under the sections shows how much wall is left, and Add section offers that space, less one more panel and 1/2 in. (12 mm) for fitting, as the new section's width when that is at least 12 in. (300 mm).
4. Check the plan. The drawing is to scale, with the clear height of every opening and the hanging space under each rod. Anything under "Fix before you build" doesn't fit; "Check these" flags shelves that will sag, rods that need a center support and tight clearances.
5. Open in Sheet Optimizer. The parts go to the cut list optimizer on 4 × 8 ft (2440 × 1220 mm) sheets with a 1/8 in. (3.2 mm) kerf, grain locked on visible plywood parts. Change the sheet size there if yours differ, then print the cutting diagrams. Backs open as their own list because they come from thinner stock.

Reach-in or walk-in

A reach-in closet is usually one wall about 24 in. deep behind doors. Plan one run across the back. The ends behind the wall returns beside the door are hard to see and reach, so use them for long hang or things you rarely need, and keep drawers inside the door opening: a drawer behind the return can't open past it. Sliding doors run on a track inside the opening, so measure the depth to the inner track, not to the face of the wall.

A walk-in closet has a run on two or three walls. Plan each wall as its own run here, with the depth you can give it before the walkway. Clothes on hangers take about 24 in. and shelf towers 12 to 16 in.; keep at least 36 in. clear between runs, which is also the minimum clear width of an accessible route in the ADA standards (section 403.5.1). Where two runs meet in a corner, the panels of one block part of the other, so plan the corner as shelves you reach into rather than hanging space.

Standard heights and depths

There is no building code for closet rods and shelves; these are the numbers most closets are built to, and the planner's defaults. Rod heights are to the rod's center.

For shoe shelves, measure the tallest pair that will live there and add an inch. Angled shelves show more of each shoe and need a lip to stop them sliding; flat shelves on pins hold more and adjust for boots. Shelves above about 72 in. are hard to see into, so keep the top shelf for things you take down a few times a year.

Choosing materials

• Plywood is the stiffest of the three for its thickness and holds screws better than particleboard or MDF, edges included. Prefinished maple or birch plywood saves finishing the inside of every section. The edges need iron-on veneer banding.
• Melamine (particleboard with a plastic face) is the cheapest finished option and wipes clean. It is heavy, chips unless the blade is sharp and the cut is scored, and holds screws poorly in its edges: use confirmat screws (7 × 50 mm for 16 to 19 mm board) with their stepped drill, or cam fittings. It comes in 5/8 and 3/4 in. (16 and 18 or 19 mm); the thinner board saves weight but spans less.
• MDF is flat and paints well, but it is as heavy as melamine, sags like particleboard and swells if it gets wet. Prime its edges before painting.
• Backs are optional. A closet's wall is already a back; backs make shelf towers stiffer and cleaner to look into. The planner uses 1/4 in. (6 mm) plywood or hardboard nailed to the panels.

The planner warns when a shelf spans further than the material carries without visible sag under a full load. The limits come from WoodBin's shelf span table (10 in. deep shelves at 20 lb per square foot, about 1/32 in. of sag per foot of span) and scale with thickness, because sag per foot grows with the cube of span over thickness. WoodBin gives 26 in. for 3/4 in. particleboard and doesn't list MDF; the planner applies the particleboard figure to melamine and MDF too. Folded clothes weigh less than books, so a slightly longer shelf may be fine, but particleboard creeps under a constant load, so its sag grows over time. For a particular load, the Sagulator works it out.

Spans are rounded down to the 1/16 in. or 0.1 mm the planner shows. If a section has to be wider, split it with a divider, or glue a 1 1/2 in. (38 mm) wide support cleat to the front of each shelf. WoodBin's table puts 3/4 in. plywood with one such cleat at 42 in.

How the parts are worked out

• Panels run from the floor to the underside of the top shelf (unit height less one thickness), or to the top of the unit when each section has its own top. A run of n sections has n + 1 panels.
• Shelves between panels are the opening width when screwed in, the opening plus two dado depths when set in dados, and the opening less 1/16 in. (1.5 mm) when adjustable, so they drop onto the pins without binding.
• The top shelf sits on all the panels. A run longer than a sheet is split over the center of a panel, so both pieces bear on it.
• Rails are 3 1/2 in. (90 mm) strips at the top back of every section, and at the floor in hanging sections, which have no bottom. They tie the panels together and take the screws into the studs. Every shelf inside a section, including the long hang shelf and the one over a drawer stack, has to sit below the top rail; the planner flags any that don't.
• Shelf, shoe and drawer sections stand on a bottom over a toe kick. Angled shoe shelves tilt 15° front edge down, are screwed in at the angle (simpler than cutting angled dados) and get a 2 in. (50 mm) lip glued over the front edge, so the lip is banded instead of the shelf.
• Hardware: four shelf pins per adjustable shelf; one rod per tier, cut 1/4 in. (6 mm) short of the opening, with a pair of sockets 12 in. from the wall and a center support past 48 in.; edge banding for every exposed front edge plus 1 in. (25 mm) each to trim; and a screw count to buy against.

Sizes are rounded to the nearest 1/16 in. or 0.1 mm. The methodology page covers how the optimizer then lays the parts out.

Building and installing

Before assembly

Cut from the optimizer's diagrams and pencil each part's section number on an edge that won't show. Band the front edges while the parts are flat. Drill shelf-pin holes with a jig and a stop collar, matching the rows on facing panels so shelves sit level: 5 mm pins on 32 mm spacing are the European system, and 1/4 in. pins are common in the U.S. On a panel shared by two sections, offset the rows on its two faces by half a step so the holes don't meet in the middle.

Floors, walls and scribing

Find the studs and mark them on the wall above the unit's height. Check the floor with a long level: shim under the panels and toe kicks until the bottoms are level, or build a level base first and set the run on it. On carpet, cut the carpet and pad back to the floor where the panels and kicks will stand, or the unit will rock and settle. Where an end panel meets a wall that isn't plumb, hold it in place, set a compass to the widest gap, trace the wall's line onto the panel and cut to it with a slight back bevel. Leaving 1/2 in. of the wall's width unused and closing the gap with a scribed filler strip is often easier.

Anchoring

Fasten every section to the wall through its rails, two screws into each stud (#10 × 3 in., or 5 × 80 mm, reaches through a 3/4 in. rail and drywall well into the stud). Where no stud lands behind a short rail, use toggle bolts. A tall unit that isn't fastened can tip forward, especially with its drawers open. If you assemble on the floor, check the planner's headroom note: a run assembled on its back swings through the diagonal of its height and depth as you stand it up, and that has to clear the ceiling. Single panels stood up one at a time only need about their height.

Lights in closets

The model electrical codes limit closet lights. The National Electrical Code (section 410.16) and the matching section of the International Residential Code (E4003.12) don't allow incandescent fixtures with open or partly enclosed lamps, pendant fixtures, or bare lampholders such as keyless or pull-chain sockets (whatever bulb is in them) in a clothes closet, and keep other fixtures a set distance from the closet's "storage space": 12 in. for a surface-mounted fixture with an enclosed incandescent or LED lamp, and 6 in. for surface-mounted fluorescent and for recessed fixtures. That space is defined partly by the shelf width, so a deeper top shelf can put an existing fixture too close. Check with your local building department before you move or add a light.