Props Closet Organization • Part 1

Part of my role as the Live Production and Programming Director is to oversee the creation, building, purchasing, and distribution of props and costumes.

With the quick turnaround between our shows, it can be daunting to keep up with every little prop or costume needed, especially when it comes to storage. As with most projects, overseeing props and costumes starts with a good organization plan.

When taking on this job, I inherited a props closet filled to the brim with items used over the years. It had become a bit neglected, to say the least. Attempting to walk into the props closet was stressful. You couldn’t even see the floor.

I wasn’t sure where to begin looking for anything we needed, but I couldn’t bring myself to purchase items that could potentially be in that closet. Keegan, our intern at the time, and I decided it was finally time to put a plan into action.

Whenever encountering a project this big, break it into smaller projects to not be overwhelmed. This was just part one of our plan.

Part One: Toss, Donate, or Keep

We started with clothing and shoes. Anything ripped, stained, dingy or missing major costume pieces was tossed immediately, and there was a lot of that! We made a donate pile for items we didn’t need anymore but were still decent.

Anything we thought was salvageable, we put in piles of pants, shorts, shirts, dresses, and all the random costumes were categorized as well—animal costumes, food costumes, pirate costumes, etc.

We decided to wait on going through wigs, beards, and hats, but we did put them in piles. All in all, It took about 6 hours.

Keegan and I had been throwing the unwanted items down to the lower level closet. We became so focused on getting the upstairs cleaned that we didn’t realize we had literally buried ourselves alive, and had to call a friend to unbury us.

We made a huge dent in the closet that day! I was glad to be able to see the floor and get remaining costumes back on hangers, but we knew this was just part one.