Buy on internal depth, not the number on the box. 55 cm of clear internal depth holds shirts and knitwear on hangers; 60 cm holds a full mixed wardrobe including suit jackets; 65 cm is what coats need. Below 55 cm, garments cannot hang square to the rail and lean against the back panel, which is where creased shoulders and halved rail capacity come from.
Shop the pieces in this guide
Internal depth by garment
A hanger is roughly 42–45 cm wide, and a garment on it needs clearance in front and behind. Shoulder width for an adult is 45–50 cm, and a jacket adds 6–8 cm of body on each side of the hanger.
| Internal depth | Hangs square | Hangs at an angle | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| 43–45 cm | Children's clothing, shirts on slim hangers | Everything adult | Bedroom for one child, or a hall cupboard |
| 50 cm | Shirts, blouses, t-shirts, trousers on a bar | Jackets, coats | Second bedroom, guest room |
| 55 cm | Shirts, knitwear, most dresses, jeans | Tailored jackets, winter coats | Minimum for a main bedroom |
| 60 cm | Everything except long coats | Long wool coats, puffer jackets | The realistic default |
| 65 cm | All adult clothing, coats included | — | Hall wardrobes and coat storage |
Garments that hang at an angle lose roughly 30% of the rail length they occupy, because each one pushes its neighbour sideways. A 100 cm rail that holds 45 shirts hanging square holds about 30 when they are turned.
What the door takes off the front
External depth includes the door, the hinge, and the gap that stops the door rubbing the frame. Subtract it before you compare products.
- Hinged doors: 18–20 mm door panel plus 10–15 mm of hinge clearance, so a 60 cm cabinet gives about 57 cm inside.
- Sliding doors: two panels running in separate tracks eat 8–10 cm of depth. A 60 cm sliding wardrobe gives 50–52 cm inside, which is the "why does nothing fit" complaint in one sentence.
- Fabric and non-woven wardrobes: the cover is 1–2 mm, so a 43 cm unit really is 43 cm. That is why a 150 × 43 × 162.5 cm folding wardrobe is a shirts-and-knitwear unit, not a coat unit.
- Drawers inside a wardrobe: the drawer box is 10 cm shallower than the carcass to clear the door, so a 60 cm wardrobe gives a 45–48 cm drawer.
The sliding door penalty in practice
Sliding doors solve a space problem in front of the wardrobe and create one inside it. For a 120 cm wide unit, plan the layout around 50 cm of internal depth: a single rail across the full width, plus one shelf stack at 35 cm deep for folded items, and no deep drawers. If you want both full-depth hanging and sliding doors, the carcass has to be 65–70 cm, which is the number that surprises people in a 3.2 m wide bedroom.
Corner and L-shaped runs
A corner wardrobe has one dead zone: the 55–60 cm square where the two runs meet, which you cannot reach from either door. Three ways to use it, in order of cost:
- Leave it as carcass and store suitcases and bedding in it through a side access panel.
- Corner carousel (half-moon shelves on a rotating post): recovers 60–70% of the dead zone, costs more than the wardrobe.
- Diagonal corner door at 45°: gives a 90 cm opening, needs 90 × 90 cm of floor, and loses about 0.15 m² of room compared with a square corner.
Measure the room, not just the wall
Three clearances decide whether the depth you bought is usable:
- 90 cm of free floor in front for a hinged door to open and for you to stand and reach the rail. Sliding doors need 60 cm.
- 5 cm above the carcass if the ceiling is uneven — older flats rarely are level, and a 176.5 cm wardrobe in a room with a 175 cm low point will not stand.
- Skirting board. A 12 mm skirting pushes the unit 12 mm off the wall and leaves a gap behind the top. Either notch the back panel or accept the gap and seal it.
If you are still deciding between door types, the sliding versus hinged comparison covers the swing radius; for shelf and rail splits inside the carcass, see the interior layout guide.
Keep reading
More dimension guides are in the collection, and the full index is on the furnolio journal.
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