Custom Closets in Woburn, MA

Streamlined Design and Installation Process

Mad Garages and Closets designs and installs custom closets for Woburn, MA houses, including walk-in closets, reach-in closets, kids closets and closet organizers. The city went up in two big waves and both of them built small closets. Much of the older housing predates 1940. A large share of the rest arrived in the two decades after the war, when Route 128 went through along the west side and the land behind it filled in. A bedroom closet from either wave is about twenty-four inches deep with one pole under a fixed shelf, and the wall above that shelf does nothing at all. The consultation is free and it happens in your house, because the numbers that decide a layout come off a tape measure.

Custom Closet Services in Woburn, MA

There are four kinds of house in Woburn as far as closets are concerned, and yours decides most of what the work involves.

The postwar capes and ranches are the biggest group. In a cape the upstairs bedrooms sit under the roof, so full hanging height only exists away from the knee wall, and the closet is often a low door into the eaves. Custom closets there put one short hanging section where the ceiling is full height, then run drawers and shoe shelving back under the slope. In a ranch the closet is wider and shallower, usually behind doors that slide on a track, so half the opening is blocked at any given moment.

Two-families and converted two-families are the second group, and there are a lot of them here. Those units get one shallow closet per bedroom and a single hall closet doing coat and linen duty at once, so custom closets have to make one opening do the work of two. The stair to the upper unit is usually enclosed and turns at a landing. We size the case to that stair at the measure rather than finding out with a van at the curb.

The pre-1940 houses in the older neighborhoods near Woburn Center went up before bedroom closets were standard. Whatever closet is in them now was cut in afterwards, usually a shallow box against a chimney chase, with plaster and lath and no framing where you most want to fasten. Custom closets in those rooms get solid backing behind every load point, and the end panels get scribed to walls that stopped being straight a long time ago.

The condominium and townhouse stock built later is the last group. Those units have the square footage and a builder’s idea of what to do with it: one wire shelf, a bare bulb, and a party wall nobody should fasten to blind.

Our custom closets in Woburn, MA are drawn off a free in-home visit. The designer takes the opening, the ceiling, the door swing and any heat running along the wall, then goes through what has to fit. That is work clothes for whoever catches the Lowell Line at Anderson Regional Transportation Center, coats for a household with no mudroom, and the wet gear that comes back from Horn Pond. You see the layout in 3D and move what you want moved, and the estimate and the install date come off that drawing.

Maximize Storage for Everyday Living

Custom closets do four different jobs in a Woburn house, and each one is built around what is already in the room.

Walk-In Closets. Walk-ins here are mostly in the newer condominium and townhouse stock, and they nearly always arrive with a single wire shelf around the perimeter. Two things go to waste in that layout: the middle of the floor, and the wall above the shelf. Custom closets get both back with floor-to-ceiling towers around the perimeter and a drawer bank on the wall opposite the door.

Reach-In Closets. A reach-in in a postwar house gives up depth to the door frame and height to a shelf nailed in place before anyone moved in. Custom closets take that shelf out. The same box then holds two levels of hanging on one side, full-length hanging on the other, and a drawer stack where the shoes sit in a heap. If the closet still has mirrored doors on a track, say so at the consultation, because whether they stay changes what can go in the middle of the opening.

Kids Closets. Kids closets in a cape are their own problem, because the upstairs bedrooms are the shared ones under the roof. Custom closets divide that opening vertically rather than horizontally, so each child gets a full-height column with their own hanging and drawers. The alternative is one of them inheriting a top shelf they cannot reach. Poles and shelves move up on adjustable pin spacing as they grow, which is a screwdriver job rather than a rebuild.

Closet Organizers. Organizers come last, after the layout is settled, because each one takes space from hanging and has to earn it. The ones that earn it most often here are a tip-out hamper, a pull-out rack for belts and ties, and shoe shelving pitched forward. The hamper matters where the laundry is two floors down, and the pitched shelving is what lets you identify a shoe from the doorway.

Closet Features That Help You Stay Organized

Five things go into every one of our custom closets.

• Soft close hinges, adjustable, so a door shut hard twice a day for five years can be brought back into line with a screwdriver
• Adjustable shelves on drilled pin spacing, so the shelf holding folded shirts in June can drop in November to take a bin of boots
• Full extension drawers, which is the only way the back of a drawer in a shallow closet ever gets used
• Thermally fused laminate, edge banded in 3mm where it shows, so the corner by the door does not chip the first time a vacuum handle catches it
• A lifetime guarantee on all wood products

Three things move the price of custom closets in Woburn, MA. How many feet of wall the system runs along, how many drawers go into it, and whether the run has to work around baseboard heat or a wall that is out of true. All three are separate lines on your estimate, so if the total comes back high you can see where to take it out.

Declutter and Organize Your Linen Closet

The hall linen closet in a cape or a two-family is whatever was left over beside the stairwell, which is why it is usually the shallowest closet in the house. Its shelves are fixed where the builder put them, and that spacing costs you most of it, because a folded flat sheet and a folded comforter want very different clearances. Custom closets reset the shelves to what you actually store, add one divided section per bed size, and put sliding baskets at the bottom for the small items that will not stack. The same box then holds more, and you can see into it.

Your Closet Design Professionals

Mad Garages and Closets has been building custom closets for homeowners in Woburn, MA for more than a decade, which is long enough to have worked in most of what the city has. Capes, ranches, two-families, townhouses and the older houses near the center are all familiar ground. Everything is cut to your dimensions at our shop at 8 Industrial Way in Salem, NH, so a panel that goes back for a recut is remade rather than trimmed on site. The designer who measured your closet is still on the job at install and still answering the phone afterward.

Why Mad Garages and Closets Is a Trusted Partner

Homeowners in Woburn, MA choose our custom closets for how the work goes in.

• We work around fin-tube baseboard heat rather than boxing it in, which means holding the case off the wall or ending the run short of the element
• We find the framing and add backing before anything hangs on it, whether the wall is plaster over lath or drywall on studs that are not on a modern layout
• We measure the enclosed stair and its landing in two- and three-unit houses, then size custom closets to get up in one trip
• We tell you at the measure what happens to the old tracks, the wire shelving and the anchors behind them, so the wall repair is not a surprise
• Nothing is built until you have approved a 3D layout with real dimensions on it, and moving a drawer bank at that stage costs nothing

Custom Closets in Woburn: Common Questions

There is baseboard heat running along the wall where the closet would go. Does that rule the wall out?

Usually not, but it changes the design. Fin-tube baseboard needs air moving through it, so custom closets either end the cabinet run short of the element or hold the case off the wall and finish the gap. Enclosing the heat behind a panel is the one thing we will not do. Tell the designer at the consultation which walls have heat on them, because it is the most common reason a layout has to move in the postwar houses here.

Our closets have the builder’s white wire shelving. What does the wall look like after you take it out, and do we have to repaint?

Wire shelving comes out with plastic anchors along the whole run, and those leave holes behind. We take the old shelving and its hardware out, and most of that wall ends up behind the new panels anyway. Painting is not part of the job, so if the closet interior has never been painted, or the color is one you cannot match, plan on doing it after we are out.

Our closet has one bare bulb with a pull chain. Can the design allow for proper lighting?

Yes, and it is worth raising early. We can leave a chase or a cabinet detail for a fixture, so the design has room for it rather than having it cut in afterwards. Anything hard-wired is licensed electrical work and a separate trade from cabinetry, so that part gets arranged on your side. Bring it up at the consultation and the layout will account for it.

We cannot do the whole house at once. Can we do one closet now and match it in a year or two?

Yes, and we keep the specification on file so a later closet can be built to the same one. The thing to know is that laminate colors and door styles do get discontinued over time, so nobody can promise an exact match years out. If matching matters to you, do the rooms that will be seen next to each other in the same phase, and leave the ones nobody sees together for later.

Our townhouse shares a wall with the unit next door. Does that limit what can be built against it?

It limits what gets fastened to it rather than what gets built. Custom closets on a party wall are built as floor-based units that carry their own load and touch the wall only enough to stay upright. We check what that wall is made of at the measure. If the association has rules about drilling into it, get us a copy before the drawing is finished rather than after.

Begin Your Home Improvement Project Today

Point us at the closet that is causing the trouble and we will come and measure it. Custom closets in Woburn, MA start with that visit and a drawing you can hold us to. Call (603) 865-1444 or use the form below.