Hanging Shoe Organizer

This page has instructions with pictures on how to make a cloth fabric shoe organizer that can hang in your closet. This shoe organizer can be hung on the wall of your closet with a wooden dowel as I did or perhaps you may use the idea and modify it to hang on the door of your closet with a pair of sturdy over the door hooks.

This shoe rack organizer can hold 24 pairs of shoes against the wall.

Each of the 24 pouches are made to hold a pair of shoes, not just one shoe.

This hanging shoe organizer rack has a finished size of 26 inches wide and 74 inches high.

How to Make a Hanging Shoe Organizer

What can I say... I like shoes.

This was from a piece of home upholstery fabric with a heavy linen look and a tan trim that looked similar to burlap to strengthen the edges against stretching.

To make one like this you would need 2 & 2/3 yards of 54 inch wide fabric and 2/3 in the trim fabric.

The easiest way to cut these fabric pieces is with a cutting mat, rotary blade and clear ruler.

Cut your background piece of fabric 79x27 inches.

Cut the 6 strips of fabric that will become shoe organizer pockets to measure 8x47 inches.

Cut 6 strips of trim fabric 4x47 inches.

On the background piece of the shoe organizer, zigzag the outside edge of the fabric all the way around to prevent fraying.

TIP On all straight sewing when you begin a seam, after 1/2 inch of sewing go in reverse to lock the stitching then continue the rest of the seam and again at the end of the seam repeat the process to make ends of a seam stay together.

Fold over and pin 1/2 inch to hem both long sides of the fabric. Press and topstitch in place.

Lay the shoe organizer face down. At the top edge, fold over 1/2 inch hem and pin.

Fold that edge over to make a 2 & 1/2 inch hem.

Topstitch the top hem in place. Then stitch again 1/4 inch away to strengthen.

 

This creates the hemmed edge that holds either a wooden dowel or the 1x1 wooden bar when the shoe rack was finished to hang on the wall.

Here is how to make a row of pockets on the shoe organizer.

Take one of the 8x47 inch strips and one piece of the trim and pin right sides together. Seam 1/4 inch from edge for the length of the piece. Press seam up onto trim.

Fold the other long side edge of trim over 1/2 inch to make a hem on inside of what will be the pocket, pin down and topstich near the seam.

Now the raw edges of the trim have been folded inside and stitched down. Press trim edge flat and topstitch 1/4 inch from edge so that the top sdge of the shoe organizer pockets keeps a nice edge.

Press the white pocket fabric raw edges over 1/2 inch and topstitch to hem other long edge and both side edges.

Here is how to attach the first row of pockets to the shoe organizer.

For Vertical placement: At 2 inches below the stitching to hold the bar at the top of the background fabric, pin the left side of shoe pocket, on the pocket fabric and insert a pin to mark a measurement of 10 1/2 inches from edge. Then on the background fabric mark 6 inches from the left edge with a pin.

Pin down for pocket placement on three pockets with fabric ratio of 10 1/2 inches to 6 inches on background. The last pocket will be 14 1/2 inches to 8 inches of background fabric which will be the end at right side. The last pocket is made bigger to hold tennis shoes, hiking boots and big slippers.

Stitch all 5 vertical placement lines.

For Horizonal Pleating: Make 1 inch fold at bottom of shoe rack pocket and pin to form pleat. On other side of the first pocket, make next pleat as shown on image. Continue making pocket pleats across the row and pin down to secure. Topstich horizonal pleats of the shoe pockets to the shoe rack background fabric.

Pin next row of shoe rack pockets 3 1/2 inches below the the 1st finished row. Repeat this process for all six rows of pockets.

Fold over 1/2 inch of background fabric to hem bottom.

Holes were drilled into the wooden mounting bar and wood screws used to attach the shoe rack to studs in the wall.