My $4 hat and purse organizer

Somehow, I have acquired so many hats and purses that they threaten to overtake my otherwise well-organized entryway. I could purge some of these treasures. But instead, why not organize and display them at the same time?


I had been saving a large rectangular cupboard door I found at Earthwise, a local store that sells reclaimed building materials. The door is solid wood and only cost $1! I was inspired by a mirror art piece I created last year, using old drawer pulls.

The mirror is mounted on a square cupboard door, which I had painted black and gold. Why not use the same materials for a hat and purse organizer? Last month, when visiting BRING in Eugene, I had collected 11 silver pulls, for a grand total of $3.

I found a can of red spray paint in the garage -- the perfect shade of paprika. I painted the cupboard door and once it dried, I laid out the pulls to see if my idea would work. They looked a little lonely. I needed something else. Fabric? Collaged paper? I tried to picture the different options. Too busy.

Then I remembered some aqua lucite discs I'd found at a thrift store more than a year ago. I think they'd been part of a retro curtain. 

The three different sizes offered me options -- I could pair the small handles with the small discs, the medium-sized ones with the middle discs, and the largest handles with the large discs. Or I could stack them. I played around with different layouts. Here's the one I went with.

One advantage of stacking the discs is that they made the handles stick out, giving my hats and purses more to hang off.

Using painter's tape, I marked where each disc-handle pair belonged. Then I used my trusty Fiskars hand drill to make a hole in each disc. (I got it on sale at Michael's, and I've never regretted it!)

Originally, I planned to center the pull on the stack of discs. But I liked the off-center look better. After experimenting, I found the "skew" I preferred and created templates so that all the discs would have holes in the same place.

Drilling was easy, and luckily the lucite didn't crack. The last step was drilling holes in the cupboard door itself. Here's the finished piece, placed next to the mirror that inspired it and the nest of hats and purses that required it.

And here it is, with purses and hats hanging from it.

I may add some hooks at the top, to accommodate more hats. I probably could have made a more functional hat and purse hanger, but I like the way this one looks. And it only cost $4!