No matter how tight a budget, or how much we vow we won’t, most crafters seem to accumulate quite a large ‘stash’ of materials, tools and general bits and bobs surprisingly quickly.
Some of you may be lucky enough to have a dedicated craft room, others a ‘crafting corner’, and many a bookcase, crates or boxes. I am going to offer some storage suggestions and I hope that one or two are useful, no matter how big or small your crafting space.
- Paper is best stored flat, so that it stays straight and safe. Boxes of a suitable size for US Letter and A4 sized papers are quite easily obtained. You can also use shirt-boxes. 12inch paper is a bit harder to deal with. You can buy storage boxes for this size, plus plastic wallets to help protect your precious sheets. Pop small scraps into envelopes for future use.
- Sort paper by colour or theme, so you can easily find what you want. Label the boxes, envelopes or wallets! Obviously you need to keep your paper supplies somewhere that is dry.
- Sheets of rubber stamps that you temporarily stick to plastic or wooden blocks to use take up much less space than the older fashioned permanently mounted ones. You can store the sheet sorts in boxes or envelopes. Many people stick them to plastic sheets (using a glue stick) and slip them into polythene sleeves which go into ring binders. This system does make it nice and easy to browse through for what you want.
- Hole punches are heavy and take up a surprising amount of space. Be careful not to put boxes of punches up high. Very large punches are probably best just sitting on a shelf, smaller ones in sturdy plastic boxes and crates. I personally have most of mine in two wicker baskets on the bottom shelf of a bookcase.
- Crafting magazines can be safely stored in plastic or cardboard magazine files. These are quite cheap to buy from stationers, Ikea, home decor stores and many other places – but you can also make your own from empty cereal boxes. Cover your files in coordinated Tin Teddy papers and add labels. Now you will be able to find them easily when you need them. The files will stand neatly along a bookcase or other shelf. Magazine files are also great for storing large embossing panels, large stencils, craft foam sheets, stickers and other similar sized things.
Storage, the perennial crafters’ problem – Part 1 – Scrapbooking snippet no 6