Whether you are already travelling in your camper or preparing to go live in your van, camper organisation is essential to make it easy to find things is essential. Space (and weight) are very limited in a camper, so taking care of what goes where and how to organise it becomes imperative. This article will discuss coming up with a camper organisation that works for you!
Why you’d want to organise your camper
When space is limited, like in a motorhome, it is vital to have a clear organisation to find things easily and know where everything goes back. The saying “a place for everything and everything in its place” could have been said by a camper.
Now, I am the first to realise that organising is not a simple task. I am pretty disorganised myself, but I found out it is actually even more important that you know where everything belongs in a camper if cleaning up is not your strong suit.
I am known for leaving things on the table or a chair because I want to use them later, because I got distracted with something else or just because I don’t feel like putting them in their place. But in a motorhome, the number of surfaces you have to leave things on is minimal, meaning that you will soon have to clear up something to be able to do anything again. And if you have a clear organisation, it is easier to clean up which in turn means you can spend less time on it.
Another good reason to have clear organisation is that cleaning the camper becomes much more manageable! You can quickly get things out, clean what needs cleaning and put it all back without wondering how you manage to get that all in there.
READ MORE: Difference between Camper, Motorhome, RV and Trailer
How to organise your motorhome
Before you start planning your trip to the IKEA to buy organisation supplies or emptying your camper cabinets to reorganise, some planning is involved. We want to make sure our organisation makes sense for you, anyone else living in the camper, and the activities you do daily, weekly or monthly.
So first up, I’d like you to think about your camper in different sections. And think about the things that you would put in that section. These sections might depend on where you are travelling to. If you are going surfing in Portugal, and you need to take your surfboard that might need it’s own section that you wouldn’t have if you go for hikes in Switzerland…
Not sure where you want to go yet? Check out this article with great motorhome destinations.
For us, our camper consists of:
- A kitchen with both food and kitchen utensils, as well as food for our dog Isa
- A living room, which holds things for work, stuff for hobbies and anything that is entertainment
- A bedroom that contains clothes
- A bathroom which has toiletries as well as bath towels
- A garage with tools, stuff for outside and oversized items (bikes!)
Working out which areas you have in your RV makes it easier to see what needs to go where and how you would best go about organising that.
Once you’ve written out the main areas, try to write out for each of those as much as you can what will go in it.
The living room for us has:
Work stuff:
- Two laptops
- Mouses, chargers and other items that go with the laptops
- The camera
- Essential office supplies (pens, scissors, tape)
Entertainment/Hobby stuff:
- My watercolour supplies
- iPad
- Crochet/knitting stuff
- E-readers – I love my Kobo Libra 2!
Think about everything that will go in each section and check whether there are items that don’t have a place to go yet.
Oh, and be ruthless about not taking things with you while you are at it! You don’t need 50 pairs of socks or 20 USB adapters.
You can decide what goes where in your camper with all the items categorised. Sometimes what goes where is very clear, like bath towels and toiletries in the bathroom, but sometimes you have to make concessions because of the space and come up with a solution.
For us, the living area has the work and entertainment stuff, except for most of my crochet/knitting things. I have a small bag with my current project, and the rest is in a bigger storage area near our bed because it doesn’t fit in the living room. At the same time, one of our cabinets in the living room has the plates and bowls because, first, it’s closer to the table that way, and second, we didn’t have space anywhere else for it.
With all of the planning done, you can finally start organising each section and buying what you need to keep it better organised.
Our camper organisation hacks
After quite a few weeks in our camper, we have realised our best organisation hacks for organising the RV.
Let’s start with this tip: try to find multipurpose items wherever possible! For instance, we also drink wine from soda glasses. Yes, you can get plastic wine glasses, but the wine tastes just as good in an ordinary cup.
Another example is our cutting mats that double as mouse mats when working.
4 products that made our campervan life easier:
Rubber mats for things that can move
We have these rubber mats that we use under storage bins but also between several Mepal bowls, for instance, so they don’t move and make noise while driving. Such a simple thing to buy but they really help! We got ours from IKEA.
Cup holders
We have two sets of cup holders. These are foam holders with space for 6 or 12 cups, and they are amazing for keeping our glasses safe while driving. One of the holders is in our cabinet and is filled with our glassware: 4 tea glasses (glass), 4 coffee cups (plastic), and 4 soda glasses (plastic). The second one, we fill with glassware we have used but don’t want to rinse yet. You don’t need to wash your tea cup after each drink after all.
Organising clothes in a camper in packing cubes
Most of our less-used clothes are in packing cubes. Our underwear and socks are in small cubes in the middle cabinet. These are amazing, even if you don’t use them to compress the clothes. We don’t use them in our cabinets in the back because they don’t fit, so our pants, shirts and sweaters are loose.
But the best hack for our clothing is packing cubes for specific occasions/seasons like swimming, exercising, mountain biking, and winter.
Storage bins
We use storage bins in all sizes and shapes. Some storage containers have lids while others don’t, dependent on the use. Having containers for everything keeps things organised, and it is easier to stack things on top of each other.
Make sure the containers you pick are shatterproof. You don’t want to have a bumpy road and have containers break.
One of our items is a set of food containers that fit within each other. That way, they don’t take up a lot of room while not in use, but we have loads of extra storage containers when needed. We have 3 sets, which are used for food and other purposes like storing tools (once used for tools, we won’t use them for food anymore).
How we organised our camper
Want to see how we organised our camper for our Europe road trip for (at least) 6 months? Check out this blog on what we packed for our Europe Trip with our camper.
Ready for your next adventure!
Now that you’ve gotten your motorhome organised it’s time for your next adventure! Plan your next motorhome road trip or learn more about a specific country you want to visit.
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