The Golden Rule of a Clutter-Free Kitchen

updated Dec 15, 2020
We independently select these products—if you buy from one of our links, we may earn a commission. All prices were accurate at the time of publishing.
Post Image
Credit: Lula Poggi

There’s no shortcut to tidyness. Keeping a clean home requires discipline and hard work — and maybe just one little motivating maxim. You need a principle that you can carry along with you while you get busy taking your clutter to task from room to room.

You need a golden rule for keeping a tidy home… so try this motto on for size:

If you don’t use it daily, put it away.

This daily use rule helps you narrow down and sort out exactly what should stay in view, allowing you to delegate everything else to find a home out of sight and out of mind.

Here’s an example: Feeling like your counters are getting crowded? Apply the golden rule. The coffee maker that sees action twice every morning and most of the afternoons? That stays. The KitchenAid mixer that’s used once a year to make Christmas cookies? To the pantry with you. Slim down the overflowing utensil jar down to just the things that get used to make dinner every night, and put everything else away in a drawer. Soon, your kitchen is looking all nice and neat and clutter-free.

You can take the golden rule with you from room to room, cleaning off all sorts of surfaces until your whole home is looking tidy. Give it a try, especially, in the bedroom or bathroom—two rooms that always seem to collect unnecessary clutter.

And if this motto doesn’t fit? Maybe one of these will:

This post originally appeared on Apartment Therapy. See it there: The Golden Rule of a Clutter-Free Home