Recently, I traveled to Atlanta for a weekend to pay a visit to the insanely talented makeup artist Jennifer Ivey! I traveled on tour with Jen while she was the Hair & Makeup Supervisor for Disney's The Lion King North American tour. See her transform a Detroit news anchor into Scar here and visit her IMDB page here to see her incredible list of TV and Film credits.
I first organized for Jen in 2018 when she was gracious enough to house me while I was subbing on Disney's Aladdin tour in Atlanta. Not too long after that, Jen moved into a larger space and was joined by her equally-fabulous Mother, Irma. Jen wanted to create a more accessible and organized space for the both of them as they were both transitioning from living independently. They both did a lot of downsizing before I had arrived, so we were able to organize quite a few spaces in 3 days. We got to the Kitchen, Guest room, Laundry Room, Entryway table, Irma's bedroom and closet, Jen's Makeup storage closet, Jen's linen closet and part of her master closet. *whew* The Before & After pictures featured here are only a small selection of the things we accomplished. Let's take a look!
Friday - Kitchen
Jen and Irma went to a CHER CONCERT on Friday night, which left me with plenty of time to work on the kitchen! I used only the product she had in the kitchen to accomplish this job. It was important to keep things accessible for both of them, so I had to plan out quit a few changes.
Saturday - Irma's Closet & Jen's Makeup Closet
Saturday was a BIG day. I set aside an hour with Irma in the morning so she could declutter her closet. In just 30 minutes, Irma had filled 4 bags of clothes to donate! It's inspiring to have a client make confident choices in such a short period of time! The two ladies decided they wanted Irma's closet to be in the (larger) guest bedroom closet, and Jen's makeup storage to be in (smaller) Irma's closet. Both closets needed to have minimal storage on the top shelves so they wouldn't have to get out the step ladder often.
Sunday - Laundry Room & Linen Closet
The final countdown! I wanted to create order and more space for their laundry room. Getting the cleaning products off the floor so they could have access to some great drawers they already smartly placed there. The linen closet in Jen's bathroom is a great space, so she wanted to store extra makeup kit refills there as well as her personal items. Sadly, my Before laundry pictures didn't save, so please enjoy the After's. :)
And Another Thing...
Jen has beds with built in drawers for extra storage (yaaassss). This allowed us to store Irma's shoe's and linens in these spaces instead of clogging up her closet. This not only saved space, but it actually makes a lot of sense for how Irma gets ready everyday. We also placed occasionally used items (like crochet and stationary/greeting cards) in an easily accessible drawer so both of the ladies could quickly grab them as needed.
To say I was completely exhausted by Monday is an understatement, but I felt SO accomplished! I loved that both Jen and Irma felt that they could find things easily and feel better about the flow of the apartment.
One of the many benefits of me being there over the weekend was that I was able to tweak systems as we went. If something ended up being out of someone's reach, we would shuffle things around so that it functioned for everyone. If you are interested in having me out to organize for a weekend, even if you are out of the NYC Metro area, email fourthwallorganizing@gmail.com to set up a weekend! #destinationorganization
Here to say good bye is the world's most dramatic and adorable dog: Marcel.
