How to Hide Wire Clutter

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If you've been following along for a while, you're well aware that I detest clutter. Of all the clutter in the land, wire clutter is the worst of them all! The sight of tangled wires makes my skin crawl. There's actually a word for the fear of tangled wires: emplekosyrmaphobia. Apparently, Selena Gomez shares this neurosis.

I get the same feeling when I see clusters of little holes (trypophobia). Ick! Anyone else???

Now, where was I? Oh, yes. Wire clutter! I'm of the mindset that anything that is functional out of sight, should be kept out of sight. I’m into minimalist decor and clean lines. Visible wires are like pocks----no, varicose veins!----on the surface of otherwise tidy surfaces.

In this post, I'll share some clever ways to keep wire clutter corralled and concealed.

1. Behind or Beneath the Couch

If your couch is positioned in front of an electrical outlet, you're literally sitting on a gold mine of wire concealment. We plug everything, from lamps to laptops, in behind our couch. You'd never know it, but our Roomba robot vacuum is hidden under here, too!

The charging station is plugged into the wall behind the couch and lies completely hidden beneath it. We program our Roomba to clean while we're away at work (set it and forget it!), so we never see it; it's like we come home to magically clean floors each day!

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2. In the Wall

If you have a wall-mounted TV, there's no better way to hide your wires than inside of the wall itself.

The House of Hepworths has a great tutorial on how to do this:

Not Into Cutting Drywall?

This is the next best solution:

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3. In A Drawer

You can create a clandestine charging station by having an electrical outlet custom-built into a drawer. I love love love this idea and wish we'd thought of this before our kitchen reno! If you've been following along for a while, you'll know that keeping our counters clutter-free is a bit of an obsession of mine. In fact, I have a whole post on the best drawer organizers to keep your kitchen counters clutter-free.

Image via: Instagram.com/p.roduct.

4. In A Cabinet

While we didn't think to include outlets in our drawers, we made sure to have them built into one of our kitchen cabinets.

Our appliance garage is one of my favourite features in our kitchen. Having cabinet-sized appliances is a must!

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5. With Adhesive Hooks Or Cable Clips

You can use adhesive hooks or cable clips to trace wires around your furniture's silhouette, keeping them out of sight.

Images via: Hi Sugarplum.

Here's a variation on this theme to hide TV wires and cables at the back of a TV console, using a wire grid and some twist ties:

Image via Hanamarin.

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6. An Electronics Closet

The largest bedroom in our home serves as a makeshift family room. Our little family trio (quartet, if you count Charlie, the dog) only occupies two bedrooms.

Our big comfy couch and big screen TV are in here. The advantage of turning a bedroom into a TV/media room is the pre-existing bedroom closet storage.

Excuse the mess reflected in the TV screen. I'm in the midst of prepping something for a future post in here!

Instead of clothes, we keep our biggest, ugliest electronics in the closet. You've heard of a man cave? Well, this is kind of like a man closet. We had an electrical outlet installed and added some wire racks and ta-da! An electronics closet!

Since the TV is mounted on the wall that backs onto the closet, Eric was able to cut a hole in the drywall and pass the wires connected to the TV through the wall and into the closet.

Left: wires from electronics inside the closet exiting through a hole in the drywall. Right: wires continue through the wall to connect to the back of the TV. A wall plate covers the hole on the outside wall, to polish it off.

As you can see (sort of...it's a bit undecipherable to the untrained eye), his gaming systems, our amazon fire tv box, and the computer tower for our security camera system are in here. There are also some non-tv-connected electronics hidden in the closet, including our behemoth-of-a-printer, the modem, the router, and the controls for our home speaker system (which Eric wired through the main floor ceiling below and up through the closet wall!).

If you've been paying attention, you may notice the first photo in this post looks familiar. In fact, it's actually a before shot of when I first opened the door to the closet to photograph it for this post. Imagine my shock upon finding this, one of my worst fears, literally hiding in the closet like the Boogeyman! Oh, what a tangled web we weave...

After spending the morning manically untangling, I found about half of these wires weren't even connected to anything! There's actually an interesting explanation (aptly dubbed 'knot theory') for why wires are so easily tangled.

The solution? Velcro wire ties to bundle and affix the wires. Take that, wire clutter!

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7. Go Wireless

If there's a wireless version of anything, go for it. Reducing your wire burden is the simplest way to get rid of wire clutter.

If you haven't already, the first thing you should get rid of is your landline. I, personally, don't know anyone under the age of 65 who still has one.

Also, I can't remember the last time I (willingly) spoke to anyone on the phone. If I could get a cell phone without a call feature, I probably would...

Headphones are another thing that should be universally wireless. My Airpods are one of my favourite things, these days. Even if you leave them lying around, they look great. I realize this is the third post in which I've gone on about how much I love these. (You can check out my posts on the best gadgets to declutter your home and the new moms' survival kit if you need more convincing.)