Carolyn ~ Good point about heavy jackets and coats needing extra depth. I completely forgot about that because I have never used BR closets for coats! I don't know anyone who does -- coats are always kept in the closet by the outside door, bymmv. And yes, the coat closet is 34" deep. In my room with 12' closet, a) multiple bi-fold doors were used, they only take 1' foot of space when open and b) the area in front of the doors is walkway beside the bed. Walkway is needed whether or not the floor space doubles as standing-access area for the closet. One thing I learned (and it's hard to believe until you've lived with it a while) is that if you store all your clothes in the closet, you don't need the usual extra space alloted for dressers/bureaus because you don't need the dressers/bureaus! Multiple small drawers stacked up and used instead of shelves actually provide more usable area because stacks of folded clothing don't fall over, and you don't have to lift anything to reach the item on the bottom of the stack. Apparel stays clean and neat because each drawer holds only one item, or in the case of socks or undies, a limited number of items placed front to back in the drawer which are each easy to reach. Also, nothing ever gets lost at the back of the shelf because the whole drawer is visible and easy to access front to back. Okay, I probably sound like a salesman, but I'm not, it's just that I'm so impressed with how much easier life has been since I switched over to using those neat drawer-boxes. The next time you have to dig something from the bottom of a dresser drawer, think about how much nicer it would have been to just reach for it without having to dig.

5' x 5' is really not enough room for a walk in closet to have rods on both sides. (Think that you need to devote 2' to each hanging side. Now, even if that 5' was the inside measurement of the closet, that still would just leave you with a foot to shimmy down. Not enough room to maneuver or to remove clothes. At minimum, you need 6' interior measurement for width to give you a 2' center aisle. If you just do rods down one side, you have wasted a lot of space. What will you do with that space? You could do shelves, but make sure you don't block access to the hanging rod. So, look at your storage needs. Most places need more hanging space in the master, not shelves. You can use a dresser, etc., to do the same as shelves would. So, a 5'x'5' walk-in closet will give you 5' of hanging. With either of your reach-in dimensions, you get 6' or 7' of hanging space. How tall are your ceilings? If they are tall, you can do quite a bit of storage above and I would recommend the 3' depth. If your ceilings are not tall, you could go with a 2' or 2.5' inside depth. (I would stick with at least 2.5', especially if you have any coats or puffy clothing that would stick out a bit more.) Remember that the measurements I am saying are for the inside dimensions. I vote for a reach in.

Carolmka, I will try searching the Organizing forum, thanks. I considered Elfa because it is a very nice looking, flexible system. We know from experience that we want half of the hanging space to have 1 shelf and rod and half to have 2 shelves and 2 rods, and it will cost less to have our cabinet maker or GC build and install the simple elements we want.

I just built option 3, not completely finished. I think wardrobes are typical in Europe but not in US so from the perspective of resale the traditional closet is best. So far we are happy with our choice as we had been considering sliding doors which at the length and height of our closet were priced at about what I paid for the unit. The room is small so it is difficult to get a good picture. We have triple and double height hanging and pullouts for ties/belts/shoes. A not finished piece is a vanity desk and shelves above. This post was edited by 5yearslater on Sun, Jun 2, 13 at 18:28