Scary Space - Storage Solutions Debunked

We had to give back to the cave (cellar for storing stuff). I am in a panic.

The question I find myself asking more than any other is "How the heck am I going to find space for everything!!!!!" For the past couple weeks I have Google'd every possible variation of "please let me find some actual kind of storage solution before I lose my mind".

When in doubt, or, out of tequila, one must find other ways of maintaining their sanity. In New York sanity was maintained through the buying of footwear. I'd do that now except (wait for it)...I HAVE NO STORAGE SPACE!!! I'm pretty sure the flat is already unable to handle my current shoe count. I am so shoe'd.

So in the interest of my not being carted off in a straitjacket, I've decided to self-medicate. As they say Louboutins laughter is the best medicine.

Here are the ten worst, unrealistic, and assanine storage solutions and why they don't work the way home decor magazine editors think they do outside of the magical land where these editors live. I have left out the names of the websites where I found these major storage fails only because they have more lawyers than I do.

10. The hideaway television for people who live under rocks and haven't realised flat screens exist yet. Shame my parents threw away that television in a cabinet I had as a kid, think of all that free space!

9.  The most useless tray to ever be partially shoved under an armchair. All I can say is how much ad space did The Basketweaving Company buy that this ever made it into the pages of Britain's most read home decor magazine? Thankfully I now know exactly what to do with my four magazines, my remote control, and a cell phone from 1999. Maybe it's supposed to be a garbage basket?

8. The perfect solution for someone who may be short on storage space and functioning brain cells. I'm pretty sure whoever rolled these towels probably off'd themselves in a Bed, Bath, and Beyond or is having an illicit affair with the bear from the Snuggle commercials because the only way I'd think this was a clever solution was if I got hopped up on dryer sheets.

7. I can see it now. Monday morning editor's meeting. The room is packed with interns full of ideas that they've probably had to come up with because they're underpaid, like alcohol and having food to eat, and therefore live in a Manhattan studio where the bathtub in the kitchen is also their bed. In walks the editor who after a few moments of detached silence shoots down all their ideas because she's finally come up with the best kitchen storage solution of all time. Cupboards!!! Kitchen island!! Never considering any one of her interns would happily sleep in the space on top of the cupboards, a space which is mysteriously void of anything. Either these are the world's first cupboards to allow one to store their bulky kitchen wares in another time dimension or someone has no concept of what it means to sleep on your own books because there's nowhere else to put them.

6. I don't have a lot storage space and didn't need it because of being able to stash things in the cave and I'm trying to do the best with what I've got. If this situation isn't already bad enough, I apparently have to take decorating advice from blind grandmothers with bad taste in handbags. Not only is having to mount your sofa to hang up your coat one of the worst ideas I think anyone has ever had ever, but I think I could search the dumpsters of Calcutta and never find a coat rack as hideous as the one in this picture. It's like a rose trelis got jaundice and climbed up on the wall to die with only the accessories it's owner was too embarassed to bring out in public to cover up it's own hideousness.

5. The focus of this picture is supposed to be the recessed wall and the little benches with their oodles of storage space underneath the seats perfect for storing things and keeping the place tidy for when your guests come over and want to pretend they're in a paralell universe where Laura Ashley has invited you over circa 1982 to stare at the back of her head. This apparently not only provides you with less space to store things than would two high cabinets, but also frees you from that terrible thing called social interaction.

4. You're lucky enough to find a kitchen with drawers. It's a dream come true compared to your last apartment where you kept your silverware in the refrigerator. Kitchen drawers come with great responsibility. You crack under the pressure, having never been all that responsible in the first place, and instead full your kitchen drawers with rubber band balls, paper clips, house keys, your only two remaining napkin rings, White Out, and trimming ribbon because you are a jackass.

3. This closet is perfectly fine, assuming you have a closet and a deep profound love for 1) hot pink, 2) clothes hung on perfectly spaced out hangers in your favorite color the aforementioned hot pink, and 3) no sense of style whatsoever. If you don't love hot pink or have a closet this storage solution is about as useful having a tank of gas but no car while sitting on a freeway during rush hour.

2. If you're living in a place the size of a broom cupboard, but it's not because you don't have oodles of money stashed away then this is the storage solution for you. Custom made cupboards are nothing 'cause you got dividends coming in and this is just how you roll. This might not be something I would have understood before except just the other day on the Canal Saint Martin I saw Baron Rothschild having some custom cupboard put into the flap behind his refrigerator box. Apparently he's letting some friends crash in his cereal box on the Ile Saint-Louis because it has two bathrooms.

1. You're slightly underpaid. Perhaps if you earned more you'd spring for the other half of the bookshelf, but you just sprang for a basket to put under your couch for your remote control and one of those new fangled flat televions. Still you need a place to store that one candlestick and a few other miscellaneous items. You put the half shelves in, thinking to yourself if you're very careful with your spending habits, you'll be able to have real bookshelves one day. Granted you only have twenty nine books and a few photo albums you've spruced up with the ribbon you keep in your silverware drawer. But books say you're sophisticated and smart and maybe if you keep some books around, people will look at them and then afterwards look at that picture of you when you were a kid and that's what you're really after because let's face it people who keep pictures of themselves around are narcacistic a-holes.