I'm ALL about functionality. It's great when the solution is PRETTY too. Well, my husband Erik had a somewhat functional reach-in closet that was NOT show-room worthy. We needed to fix that. Here's what we did.
Since you know my love for the elfa system from The Container Store runs deep, we installed elfa in 3 closets the first year we moved into this house. The design has served Erik well, but there were some issues: cumbersome sliding by-pass doors, a creamy yellow halogen lightbulb, unfinished patch job from initial demo, revealing the ancient beige paint contrasted against fresh white paint.
It was driving us both a bit nuts to not have a BEAUTIFUL AND FUNCTIONAL closet in our house, which is supposed to be a Show Room for Pieces into Place. So we rolled up our sleeves and upgraded his closet in one weekend: patched and sanded plaster walls, new LED bulb, fresh coat of Magnolia/Kilz "Elements" paint, complementary and masculine shirt boxes, and REMOVED closet doors. MUCH better. Bonus: the elfa system is only mounted into the wall at the top track, so the rest of the components could be completely removed by me and then re-assembled when the paint dried.
Having the doors removed has encouraged Erik to keep the closet tidy, since he can't hide any junk in there. (He has nearby drawers for that. Ha!) Now he can fully access and see all his clothes and easily put things away also. He loves it!
Let us know if you need help with your closet upgrade! Start the process here.