" I'll lose the advantage of being able to see everything at once."
Why is that an advantage?
Do you really need to see everything at once?

You could put doors on some of the clothing storage--the out of season storage, for example. That way, the clothes you are currently using would be easy to see and get to, and the rest would be safe behind doors.

You could also use doors for the luggage storage, so you don't have to look at it all the time.

Unless you have a lot of clothes that don't get worn very often, I don't think there would be enough dust to do damage to the clothing. I'd be more worried about sunlight eventually bleaching the color of some clothes, so if the room gets a lot of direct sunlight, I'd consider some sort of window treatment to block the sun.

Another idea would be to get traverse curtain rods and install them on the ceiling in front of the clothes rods. One pull on the cord, you see all your clothes. Pull the cord again, they are safely behind the curtain. If you do this, you could get a rich-looking fabric to help glam up the room.

You could put doors on some of the clothing storage--the out of season storage, for example. That way, the clothes you are currently using would be easy to see and get to, and the rest would be safe behind doors.

You could also use doors for the luggage storage, so you don't have to look at it all the time.

Unless you have a lot of clothes that don't get worn very often, I don't think there would be enough dust to do damage to the clothing. I'd be more worried about sunlight eventually bleaching the color of some clothes, so if the room gets a lot of direct sunlight, I'd consider some sort of window treatment to block the sun.

Another idea would be to get traverse curtain rods and install them on the ceiling in front of the clothes rods. One pull on the cord, you see all your clothes. Pull the cord again, they are safely behind the curtain. If you do this, you could get a rich-looking fabric to help glam up the room.

"Do you really need to see everything at once?"
Only a very young person could ask that question. I'm wondering if I need a sign in the room that says "clothes," for the "What did I come in here for?" times.

I have thought about the curtain idea. I guess I need to decide how lazy I am, that is, will I want to open/close the curtains all the time? I do like the idea of doors just on some parts. That might also keep moths away from sweaters in the summer. I've come across photos of closets with glass doors. That addresses the problem of being able to see everything, but I'd guess it's awfully expensive, and you still have to open the doors, maybe with an armload of laundry.

I recently read that most people wear 20% of their clothing 80% of the time.

"Only a very young person could ask that question."
LOL! I guess that depends on what you consider young.

"I recently read that most people wear 20% of their clothing 80% of the time."
Exactly, which is why this almost-60-year old asked why you needed to see it all!

Make reading room out it with a big window or a nice office.

Clothing in closets get dusty, and closet floors get dusty too. If you want to protect your out-of-season clothing, you could put them in large garment bags made for that purpose.

And yes, out of sight means out of mind.

{{gwi:2144288}}

Here is a link that might be useful: Vinyl garment bags

TBH, I'm not remotely a young person and I had the same thought.

"I recently read that most people wear 20% of their clothing 80% of the time."
Exactly, which is why this almost-60-year old asked why you needed to see it all!

So that that other 80% of your clothes can catch your eye and maybe get out of the closet now and then.

My vote is to find a way to make that room smaller. That's a huge, huge room. That's about the size of my entire bedroom.

So find a way to have a big closet that's not the whole room. And have the room not be all closet. Put a long closet w/ doors on one edge of the room. That'll still be a huge closet.

I like the idea of maybe two closets, one for each season, both behind doors. You only open one at a time.

And put an ironing board and steamer in there.

Took me sometime to respond and I had to convert the mesurements into metric. This can't be a closet, it is a ROOM and a largish one at that. The clothes can't be left exposed as dust and sunlight will be a problem.

If I had your situation, I'll design 2 closets one for each season, so I'll never have to switch, just go to a different side of the room to dress. And design it in such a way that every time you open the doors to a compartment, you will see the whole compartment. So, open 2 doors at once, see all your shoes. Open 2 other doors, see all your work clothes and so on...

Garment bags in my opinion are a greater hassle than doors that open in one swift movement.

Since you will have a place to sit and fold, you will have a place were stacks of folded clothes will sit so you can take some clothes to put away on one hand and open the door with the other.

For folded clothes I love cubbies. Drawers are god for underwear and socks.

Glass doors not only are expensive, they will not protect clothes from light. As this is a room, I expect it has a window and sunlight does comes in. It would be depressing to have it darkened all the time.

(I myself would put a small desk under the window for writing and a comfy reading chair too!)

Your situation is "out of this world" for me, as my in season clothes hang in a one rod closet that is about 3 feet wide, folded clothes are on 4 shelves, 3 feet long each, in a cabinet at the bottom part of the bookcase in my bedroom, I have only two small drawers in my nightstand for socks, my underwear is in a cloth drawstring bag hanging in the bathroom and our shoes are in shallow shoe cabinets at the bottom of the book and media shelves in the entrance hallway.

Out of season clothes are in 2 or 3 zippered cases on shelves at the top compartment of the closet together with extra pillows and blankets and off season shoes and luggage in a storage space over the bathroom that we access with a ladder.

Good luck in your efforts, and keep us updated!

I appreciate all the suggestions, but maybe a few details about my goals will help: Yes, it is a big room. It's as big as a bedroom because it was a bedroom. We didn't need this bedroom, which adjoins the master, and did need more closet room. Without going into unnecessary boring details, it would be impractical or impossible to make it smaller, and I already am fortunate to have a nice office and reading areas, although it will be a nice alternative when I'm awake and DH is asleep.

I plan to include ironing space and luggage storage and want plenty of space to sit while putting on shoes and to fold/pack. My main quandary is how much to enclose, especially clothing; I know I need to consider the window, which faces north at least, and of course I will hide ugly things like the ironing board. I'd prefer not to have one of those island-type dressers. Ideally, this room will be convertible so that, when we're ready to sell the house, it can be a potential nursery or go back to being a bedroom.

I like the idea of separating clothes by season, but I think the reason I'm among the 80% who wear 20% of my clothes is because I forget what I have. "Out of sight, out of mind" is exactly the problem. That's certainly the case now while a lot of my clothes are in other rooms. As I'm not Paris Hilton and not yet senile, I feel confident I won't forget to wear underwear if that's in a drawer, but I want to see as many tops and pants/skirts as possible with as few as possible door openings.

Just line the walls of the room with wide closets, all of them with doors you can open (bi-fold style, perhaps). Since it's a closet room, you don't need to keep the walls free for stuff like hanging pictures on or setting the sofa up against it.

The closets will automatically make the center space smaller; that's what has happened in that pic that ClosetTec put up.

They don't have to be attached to the wall; they can be freestanding units that can be removed (though framing them in is probably cheaper).

You could also consider that not all the clothes need the same exact solution. Some can be on open rods, and others might go inside a closet/armoir unit. If you have everyday clothes that will be damaged by being exposed to light, you probably have too many clothes (and maybe you can put a UV coating on that window, bcs those are the rays that are truly damaging); stuff like evening gowns or seldom worn stuff can go behind solid doors somehow.
And you can deal with dust some other way--maybe with a drop-down piece of cloth that lies over sections. Hey, look--they make just such a closet rod cover!

Designate different walls of the room for different types of situations (one wall is cold weather, the opposite wall is summer; the short wall by the window/door is evening wear, and gets an armoire sort of thing. That sort of thing.

Put some sort of dresser unit floating in the middle of one side of the room; you can fold on top of it and store undies in the drawers.

Thanks, mrspete. You've made me feel better about my choices and mentioned a couple things I had forgotten. I'm not much of a seamstress, but I do have a sewing machine that I currently drag out of a closet and set up on a dresser in another bedroom. I should move it into the dressing room. And I do want to watch tv while ironing. You have some great suggestions, and it IS a ridiculously large closet, but it is the cheapest way to get all my clothes into the same area.

I do think dust can be a problem on seldom-worn clothes. Especially if the OP will be dressing and undressing in that room (most of dust is skin cells, actually--I get huge amounts of dust in my bathroom, for that very reason). I get a lot of dust on clothes that are in the corners of my closet. I don't wear that suit jacket very often, and so it gets dusty.

As for the natural light--I'd hate to lose it completely. The ultraviolet rays are what does the damage; you can put a film on the window to eliminate that.

http://www.amazon.com/Clear-Protection-Window-Film-Wide/dp/B004JAW3KW

And you can keep the specialty clothes (the ones that are seldom worn, and so most likely to sustain damage) behind doors.

I had a friend w/ a "dressing room" off his bedroom, and he kept his ironing board set up permanently. I've always wished i had room to do that; it would make it so much easier to iron something. And I like having my steamer out in the room (though it looks messy). At the very least, I wish I could have a drop-down ironing board.