The Home Edit Garage Storage: How to Apply Their Method to Your Space

The Home Edit approach to garage storage centers on three things: categorize everything, contain it in matching clear vessels, and label every container. Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin, the founders of The Home Edit, apply this same methodology whether they're organizing a pantry or a celebrity's three-car garage. The result looks magazine-perfect because the visual noise from mismatched containers and random clutter is completely eliminated.

You don't need to hire them, and you don't need a celebrity budget. This guide breaks down exactly how their method works, how to apply it to a real garage, what products to buy, and what the total cost looks like at different levels.

The Home Edit's Core Method

The Home Edit approach has four steps they call "Edit, Categorize, Contain, and Maintain." Here's what that means in a garage context:

Edit: Remove everything from the garage first. This isn't optional. You can't organize a cluttered garage by adding organizers to existing clutter. Take everything out, sort it into keep, donate, and trash piles, and start with a genuinely reduced set of possessions.

Categorize: Group what you're keeping by category. Not by person (though that can be a sub-category), but by type of use. All automotive gear together. All sports equipment together. All garden and lawn supplies together. All holiday decorations together.

Contain: Put each category into a container that fits the category's size and frequency of use. Frequently used items in open bins or baskets at eye level. Rarely used items in closed bins on higher shelves or in overhead storage.

Maintain: The system only works if every item returns to its designated container after use. This requires the system to be genuinely convenient. If you have to struggle to access something, it won't go back where it belongs.

Setting Up Zones in a Garage

The first physical step is defining zones on the garage walls before you start buying storage products. A zone is a section of wall and floor dedicated to one category of gear.

How to Define Your Zones

Walk into your empty garage and ask: where do we actually use each type of thing? Sports equipment that comes out for the driveway goes near the garage door. Automotive supplies for the car stay near where the car parks. Garden tools and hoses go near the backyard door if you have one.

Typical zones in a family garage:

  • Auto zone: One wall or cabinet for car care products, tools for minor repairs, jumper cables, and emergency supplies.
  • Sports and fitness zone: Near the main door, holds bikes, balls, helmets, workout gear, and seasonal sports equipment.
  • Garden zone: Near the back or side yard access, holds tools, hoses, sprinklers, seeds, and potting supplies.
  • Seasonal zone: Overhead or high shelves, holds holiday decorations, camping gear, off-season sporting equipment.
  • Overflow zone: The catch-all cabinet or closet for things that don't fit other categories but are worth keeping.

Mark the zones on paper first. Then decide what storage infrastructure each zone needs.

The Container Philosophy

The Home Edit aesthetic is driven by clear containers. The reason is functional as much as visual: clear containers let you see exactly what's inside without opening them. In a garage where you're often looking for something specific quickly, this matters.

Clear stackable bins: The workhorse container. IRIS USA, Sterilite, and similar brands sell clear bins with secure lids in standardized sizes that stack stably. Buying sets where bins nest and stack together keeps everything consistent.

Clear open-top bins: For frequently accessed items, open-top bins let you grab and replace items one-handed. These go on accessible shelves at arm's reach.

Clear labeled bins for small items: Hardware, fasteners, sports accessories, and similar small items store well in clear bins with printed labels. A label maker (Brother P-touch is the standard for this aesthetic) prints clean labels quickly.

Solid bins for specific uses: Gasoline cans, pool chemicals, and items you specifically want hidden or contained go in non-clear solid containers. This is the exception, not the rule.

Labels

The Home Edit uses consistent font labels printed on a label maker, not handwritten. Printed labels last longer, look cleaner, and are easier to read at a distance. The Brother P-touch Cube (about $40) is what most people use for this. The labels themselves cost less than $10 for a roll that lasts hundreds of labels.

Label the bin, not the shelf. If you move things around, the label stays with the container.

Shelving and Vertical Storage

The Home Edit garages typically use either built-in white cabinetry or open shelving with matching bins. The open shelving version is more achievable for most people.

Open Shelving for the Home Edit Look

Wire shelving, metal shelving, or plywood shelving on brackets all work. The visual key is that bins on the shelves are all clear and matching, so the shelving itself recedes into the background.

Adjust shelf spacing to match your bin heights. If your standard bins are 6 inches tall, set shelves at 8-inch intervals so bins have slight clearance. This makes the shelves look intentional rather than random.

For a dedicated sports gear section, open cubbies work better than shelving because balls and helmets don't stack neatly in bins. Open cubbies let you grab a basketball without disturbing everything around it.

Cabinet Storage for Items That Need Concealment

Automotive chemicals, pool supplies, power tools, and anything with an inconsistent visual profile go behind closed cabinet doors. The Home Edit approach uses white or neutral-colored cabinets that blend with the overall color palette rather than industrial gray metal.

White cabinet options that match the aesthetic: Gladiator makes white powder-coated cabinets, Husky has some white or light gray finishes, and IKEA's kitchen cabinet line (with appropriate sealing for moisture) has been used successfully in garages for this look. Our Best Garage Storage guide covers cabinet options across styles and price points.

Overhead Storage for Seasonal Items

The Home Edit method puts rarely used items out of sight and out of the way, usually overhead. Seasonal decor, camping gear, off-season sporting equipment, and extra supplies go on ceiling-mounted platforms or high shelves.

Clear labeled bins (closed-lid versions for dust protection) on overhead shelving allow quick identification without pulling everything down. The Best Garage Top Storage guide covers ceiling-mounted storage options that give you the overhead capacity for a true whole-garage system.

The Color Factor

The Home Edit is known for rainbow organization, arranging visible items by color. In a garage, this is less practical than in a pantry or closet because most garage items aren't color-coordinated by nature. The approach that works better in garages: category color coding.

Assign one color of storage bin or label color to each zone. Auto zone gets blue labels. Sports zone gets green. Garden zone gets orange. This makes it immediately obvious when something is in the wrong place and makes putting things away easier for family members who don't remember the specific system.

Budget Reality Check

The Entry-Level Approach ($300 to $500)

  • Metal wire shelving or bracket-mounted plywood shelves: $80 to $150
  • 20 to 30 clear bins in two or three matching sizes: $80 to $150
  • Label maker and labels: $50
  • Pegboard or hooks for tools and sports gear: $50 to $100

This creates the functional system, and with consistent labels and matching containers, it looks noticeably better than a random collection of mismatched storage products.

The Mid-Range Version ($1,000 to $2,000)

Adds proper cabinets for the concealment zones, higher-quality shelving, possibly a ceiling storage rack for overhead, and better hooks and accessories for tools and bikes.

The Full Home Edit Version ($5,000+)

Custom or semi-custom white cabinetry, professional installation, epoxy or sealed floor, high-end clear containers, professional organizing consultation. This is what you see in the photos.

FAQ

Does The Home Edit have a product line? Yes. The Home Edit has partnered with The Container Store to offer their branded bins, labels, and organizers. The products are solid quality, though equivalent products from IRIS USA or Sterilite cost less and perform similarly.

How long does it take to organize a garage using their method? The full process, including editing (removing and donating) and organizing, typically takes a full weekend for a two-car garage. The editing step alone can take half a day if you have years of accumulated stuff to sort through.

Do I need to buy all matching containers? Matching containers create the visual effect that makes the system look organized rather than just sorted. You don't need to buy everything at once, but buying matching bins within each zone makes a bigger difference than buying a mishmash of brands in different sizes.

How do I maintain the system over time? Build in a quarterly reset. Every three months, spend 30 minutes returning anything that migrated out of its designated zone. The bigger maintenance moments come with seasonal changes, when sports equipment rotates and holiday decor needs to be pulled out or put away.

Starting the Right Way

The single most important thing The Home Edit gets right: start with editing, not organizing. Buying bins and shelving for a cluttered garage just contains the clutter. Ruthlessly reducing what you keep first, then organizing what remains, produces a system that stays usable and looks intentional.

Pick one zone and do it completely before moving to the next. A fully organized sports zone is more satisfying and functional than four partially organized zones, and the momentum from completing one area makes starting the next one easier.