7 Tips for Storing Furniture to Maximise Space

Ever play Tetris as a child? Storing furniture is kind of like that. You’re going to be doing a lot of stacking and fitting.

To make the most of the space you have, it’s best to plan how you’re going to store every item carefully. This includes preparing your furniture and the space to make the most of it.

Read our guide on how best to position and organise furniture for storage. You’ll learn which piece of furniture should go where. We also delve into the difference between storing wooden and leather furniture items, and much more.

Top 7 Tips for Storing Furniture

1. Clean your furniture

Before storing your furniture, you’ll want to clean it. Keeping it clean has a lot to do with how efficiently you can maximise your space without damaging any of your contents. From antique furniture to metal furniture, treatment may differ. What matters is that it is clean and in a good condition when you put it into storage.

You can polish wood and treat leather furniture for short- or long-term storage. You can vacuum upholstered items and shine metal sections on larger items. Then you can stack and rack those items without having to worry about what condition you’ll find them in the next time you visit your storage unit.

2. Prepare surfaces and use coverings

This segues from cleaning your furniture. You’re likely going to be stacking items on top of one another, so it’s important to make sure all surfaces are clean. But you also want to protect the surfaces of the possessions you’re placing on top of one another.

Consider using plastic wrap, plastic sheeting, bed sheets, bubble wrap, and other materials. This can help protect against abrasions and scratches when stacking. A drop cloth is typically fine if you are only concerned about dust. To avoid breakage of fragile items such as glass, padded coverings may be more useful. For example, bubble wrap.

Plastic and bubble wrapping is also best suited to smaller knick-knacks and fragile items like crystal glasses. it can also help protect plastic furniture like washing machines during the move and the pack. If you want to put your furniture in storage without too much of a fuss, our experts can do the bubble wrapping and packing for you!

3. Storing wooden furniture

To keep your wood furniture safe for storage, make sure it’s empty—no goodies in the drawers or cupboards. Then give it a good clean with a soft cloth and furniture polish.

It’s very important to make sure the polish dries before you store it, because any moisture can ruin it over time. It may warp or even soften and break. It’s not advised that you use a damp cloth, and it is a good idea to ensure humidity levels are low in your storage unit, the warehouse, and the location.

If it’s a large piece of furniture, disassemble it. Remove the drawers, take off the legs, and take out the shelves. This makes it much easier to carry, transport, and store, leading to less chance of damage.

Don’t store wood furniture with plastic or bubble wrap because the wood needs to breathe. Again, you don’t want to trap any moisture. It’s best to drape a sheet or towel over your wooden pieces such as a dining table before stacking other items on top of them.

4. Storing leather furniture

As with all your items, clean and treat your leather furniture with a vacuum and leather conditioning. Make sure everything dries before storing to prevent moisture, leading to cracks and splits.

As with wood, don’t use anything that doesn’t allow the items to breathe to cover them, such as plastic and bubble wrap.

Ideally for leather, a climate-controlled storage unit works best. But if you follow the tips listed here, your leather contents should remain in good condition.

If you want to go the extra mile, you can store your goods on cinder blocks to lift them off the ground in the unlikely event of flooding. Our self-storage units are safe from weather and the elements, so you can rest assured that your goods are safe and dry.

5. Box up smaller items

Having a square or rectangular box makes it easy to make the most of the space you have. Boxes can be stacked ceiling high when they’re properly secured. This can save you tons of space for those bigger items like fridges and awkwardly shaped contents like couches.

6. Where to place what

Now it’s time to look at exactly how and where to store your goods. The first rule is to place the items you’re least likely to need access to at the back of the unit.

For example, If you know an overseas visitor will arrive in a few months to stay at your place. In this case, don’t pack your spare bed and bed frame in a place that means you’re unpacking half the unit to get to it. Keep it—and the side table—near the front, so you can just grab them and go.

With this in mind, it is best to store the largest pieces and heavier items at the back of the unit. Next, try to match items of the same shape together and store everything vertically as far as possible. It doesn’t make sense to lay a dishwasher on top of a couch, when you could rather stack it with a washing machine and tumble dryer.

Remember to pack the heaviest boxes at the bottom so you lessen the chances of it all coming crashing down. Pack things with an awkward shape last, and pack them as near together each other as possible.

That’s because once you’ve packed the square and rectangular items in, you’re likely to find you still have plenty of room. This will make it easier to find space for the unusually shaped goods.

7. Remember the walls

Don’t only see the floor as the storage space in a unit. You can line the walls with shelving and store smaller items, awkwardly shaped goods, and even boxes along the sides of the entire storage unit.

At Easy Store, we’ve got storage units in a variety of sizes. Our team can guide you on what size is best for your needs so that you can make the most of your storage space. Simply call us on 086 11 00 222 or email us at info@easystore.co.za.