Marie Kondo sparked a worldwide organizing revolution with the publication of her book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. On January 5, she returns with her second book for American audiences, , an illustrated guide to tackling every nook and cranny of your home. Get a head start on your closet right now:

A clothes closet that sparks joy

Storing your clothes is easy. First, hang the clothes that you are storing on hangers on the pole. If you have too many to hang, fold as many as possible to save space and store them in a set of drawers placed underneath the pole. Use these drawers to store clothing-related komono* as well, and any other komono categories that seem to fit, such as accessories and items you use daily.

In general, the shelf in the top of the closet is for bags, hats, off-season komono, and sentimental items. If more than one person uses the closet, be sure to assign individual space for each person. If you have any clear plastic cases or shelf units, I recommend using these as storage units and placing them inside the closet, too, if there is room. If you have just moved in and don't have any drawers to store your clothes, the perfect time to pur­chase some is when you've finished your joy check.

If you have a walk-in closet, fully exploit its impres­sive depth and width. Choose deep drawers that fit the closet perfectly for storing folded clothes. The upper shelf can also be used to store seasonal items and things that are only used occasionally, such as holiday decorations and recreational goods.

The great attraction of walk-in closets is the fact that they are deep. Yet the plain walls can look very broad and bleak. As I mentioned earlier, this gives you a perfect opportunity to add some essence of joy. One of my clients covered a corner of her closet with her wedding pictures and stored all her wedding-related items in this spot, including the welcome board and the ring cushion case. "I would have felt a bit embarrassed to display these things where everyone could see them. Now, I just have to open my closet door to bring back that same feeling of joy I had on my wedding day." The shy smile on the face of this normally dry and businesslike client brought back sweet memories for me, too.

The closet is a space where you are free to do what­ever you want. One client who really enjoyed coming up with creative solutions used the space below as a parking spot for her children's ride-on toys. The latter proved to be quite popular because the children made a game out of parking their toys when they put them away. If you view the walk-in closet as a small room, you will be able to create a beautiful storage space.

My approach to closets evolved from my own expe­rience. I was therefore astounded one day to discover that I wasn't the first. While visiting the Yayoi Museum in Bunkyo Ward, Tokyo, I saw an illustration of the ulti­mate Japanese closet storage. Entitled "Closet Ideas," it showed a closet with a bookcase inside it. A beautiful doll rested on top while a pretty cloth had been draped over the shelves to conceal them. The illustration was printed in Himawari, a popular girls' magazine published by the famous Junichi Nakahara in 1948. Obviously, over sixty years earlier someone was not only using the Japanese closet in a Western style but was making it beautiful to boot. The illustration embodied my theory that the closet should be considered an extension of the room. It is a marvelous storage space that can be decorated just like a room and concealed behind closed doors.

*miscellany

Reprinted from SPARK JOY Copyright (c) 2016 by Marie Kondo. Illustrations copyright (c) 2012, 2015 by Masako Inoue. Published by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.

In case you forget Kondo's famous folding technique, here's a refresher, courtesy of New York Magazine:

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Julie Kosin Senior Culture Editor Julie Kosin is the senior culture editor of ELLE.com, where she oversees all things movies, TV, books, music, and art, from trawling Netflix for a worthy binge to endorsing your next book club pick.

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