I am planning on storing my daughter's winter clothing and I was wondering if anyone has any tips for storing clothing in the garage and keeping it from getting mildew or bad smells. Any suggestions?
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I strongly suggest investing in the giant sized Space Bags (walmart). You suck the air out of the using the vacuum. They are great plus they will give you more room. I had the same problem with the musty smell. Not any more!
We use the very large Rubbermaid Plastic Totes with a strong plastic bag inside the tote. Add the clothing, blankets or winter wear of all sorts, and a couple bars of good smelling hand soap like Tone, and store them for 20 years if you have to. When you open them, you only need to shake them out and hang them up or put them on your bed. They are clean when you store them, them they will be just as clean and sweet-smelling as they were when you packed them away.
Be sure to put twist ties on the large plastic bags to keep it all inside...and you can even add wide Scotch tape
around the lid of the tote if you want to. This is the best way I've ever found to store these items for as long as needed. All the best, Julia in Boca Raton, FL
The best thing I have found for storage is the big plastic Totes that you buy at Walmart or Dollar Stores for around $10.00.They will keep things dry and mildew free and will hold lots of clothes. Plus they don"t take up a lot of space and you can stack them without anything getting mashed inside. I use them for clothes christmas decorations, and even glass items and silver.
plus to keep that "storagey" smell away put a couple of fabric softener sheets in each tote.
The good thinking about using rigid storage like the totes mentioned by Sharon (vs. bags) is that they stack like blocks - it's less easy to do that with bags.
see these sites
theblufish.com/
housekeeping.about.com/cs/garageandstorage/a/storingclothes.htm
I like the sterilite containers (like Sharon said.) The space bags (vacuum) work great too, and you can store those ANYWHERE (my dh uses them for his hunting outfits) We combine the two to save on space
I have used both vacuum bags and totes. The trouble with the bags was that it was very easy to make holes in them and after a while, they became brittle and cracked and developed holes anyway. To be fair, mine were exposed to high temperatures in our utility trailer.
I use the the big plastic coated, "refugee" bags with zippers that I get from the dollar store for amazingly, $1.50. I put dryer sheets in them, zip 'em, and store them in my attic. I also label them using wide tape. Works great.
My son also used these bags when moving back and forth through his college dormitory years. worked great. Yeah, he looked like a refugee but what college student doesn't?
I use my vacuum storage system (the kitchen one) and create large bags to store my out of season clothes and even comforters in. Actually I use a 3-step system.
First I put the clothes (or comforters/blankets) into a Space Bag along with 2 or 3 dryer sheets to keep them smelling fresh, and vacuum out all the air. But since I have found that the Space Bags don't keep the air out, I also create large bags using my kitchen vacuum storage system and put these around the space bag, then vacuum the air out again.
Once I've done that, I place the vacuumed bags into bins to protect them from punctures, etc. By using the vacuum systems I am able to put a lot more into one bin than I would otherwise, thus saving a lot of storage space.
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