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Power tools plus plywood equals better storage space.

Everybody needs more space. But if you can’t add more square footage to your living area, at least you can add storage area by building a DIY closet organizer, a little plywood box with dividers. These work well for storing and neatening articles and garments that aren’t easy to hang, such as gloves, sportswear, workwear, hats, and shoes.

We built the closet organizer you see here from ½-inch Baltic birch plywood, but you could also use ¾-inch-thick plywood. We dressed up the its front edge by applying iron-on birch edge banding. The organizer’s design is such that you can hang it on a wall horizontally or vertically (if the floor is smooth and flat, you can stand it). We applied one coat of cabinet undercoater for the primer and two coats of satin enamel paint for the topcoat. There are no fancy woodworking joints. We butted the parts together and fastened them with pocket screws. You can also join the parts with 6d or 8d finish nails and drive wood screws (or coarse-thread drywall screws) through the sides and into the ends of the dividers. Our plans provide size and spacing information, but feel free to make it any size you like. Based on these dimensions, you can build two organizers from one sheet of plywood.

Below are some tools that you’ll find helpful. As much as we like using the Ryobi PTS01 track saw, you can get by without it. If you’re careful, you can make the same cuts carefully guiding a circular saw along a straight edge.

Keep scrolling for the step-by-step directions that take you through the build: plywood processing, mark out and assembly, and the finishing sequence (edge banding, plugging, and painting).

Let’s get started.

It’s a simple matter to cut the organizer’s parts from a sheet of plywood. It comes down to this: Using the factory edges as your reference line, rip two pieces of plywood to 9-¾ inches wide. That is, cut along the sheet’s long axis with a circular saw. Use one factory edge to make one rip cut. Use the opposite factory edge to make the second rip cut. Next, crosscut the parts to the dimensions shown in the drawing.

Here are the fine points. When ripping plywood to width using a circular saw, whether it’s a track saw or a circular saw guided by a straight edge, be mindful of where your saw horses are. Overhang the plywood on the saw horses, begin your cut, then stop and look underneath to see where you are relative to the horse. Reposition the saw horses to avoid cutting into them, then advance the cut and repeat the procedure at the second saw horse.

To “mark out” means to draw lines (and sometimes symbols) on wood, metal, or masonry to indicate how and where pieces are joined. Construction projects such as a house, furniture, stairs, or a boat require a mark out sequence.

Woodworkers, carpenters, masons, machinists, and other tradespeople distinguish between marking (or markings) and mark out. A mark can be anything from a blemish or smudge to a deliberate mark that conveys shipping (or other) information. The process of mark out is deliberate and prepares parts for assembly by indicating their position.

In the case of our organizer, the mark out sequence begins by you measuring along the factory edge (no matter how accurately you cut, this edge is still straighter and more accurate than the edge left by your saw) and drawing sharp lines to indicate the positions of the dividers. The H-shaped divider is prepared as a subassembly and fastened by driving screws through the sides of Part A (see the diagram above).

There are a few key concepts here:

Here’s the entire step-by-step mark out and assembly sequence.

You can apply edge banding, then plug the pocket screw holes, or vice versa. After those two operations are out of the way, sand the organizer inside and out, wipe off the dust with a rosin tack cloth or a lightly moistened cotton cloth, and apply your finish.

On our project, we used paint-grade wood plugs specifically suited for pocket screws. Note that these plugs are sized for joining ¾-inch-thick stock. Thus, you need to shorten them by sawing about ¼ inch off their length. This will result in an imperfect fit with some plugs. No matter; sand them flush if they are slightly oversize or apply wood filler over them if they are slightly undersize.

To sand wood plugs flush quickly, you need fairly coarse sandpaper. Use a random orbit oscillating sander, and begin with a 36-grit disc to make the plug flush with the adjoining surface. Then switch to 50-, 80-, 120-, 150- and 220-grit discs. If the plug makes a satisfactory fit (flush with the surface), sand with 120-, 150-, and 220-grit discs. The same grit sequence (120, 150, 220) applies to all other surfaces that don’t have plugs, the inside and outside surfaces of Part B, and the non-plugged surfaces of Part A.

Here’s the entire process.