In a recent guest post, Lain Ehmann gave us 7 Guidelines for Purging Craft Supplies, and she’s back today with some more great tips for organizing your craft room. Be sure to read right through to the end for a special offer exclusive to readers of the Managing Modern Life® blog!

If you’re a crafter of any type, you’ve got STUFF. And you need a place to keep that stuff – whether it’s needles, scissors, fabric, or power saws. There are Flickr galleries, websites, magazines, and blogs dedicated to craft rooms, studios, workspaces for beaders, knitters, quilters, and scrapbookers like me, among others. And based on the images published via these media, you’d think if you don’t have an entire floor of your home to give over to your craft, you might as well pack up your needles and thread and dump them in the nearest landfill.

Well, let me tell you that it IS possible to get organized, no matter if you’re working at your kitchen table or you have the luxury of a separate, stand-alone workshop. Here are some basic principles that will help you get your gear in shape, even if you’re working with an under-the-bed storage bin:

  1. Purge before you try to organize. You can’t organize clutter. And why waste time sorting and containerizing materials you are never going to use? Spend time getting rid of outdated or unused materials instead of holding on to anything and everything, “just in case.”
  2. Build in room to grow. If you are truly passionate about your craft, you’ll be adding to your collection over time. Your collection of yarn, paper, adhesive, hammers, whatever, will be growing, so plan for a larger number. Otherwise you’ll just have to redo everything in a short period of time.
  3. Set an upper limit. If you are tight on space, divide up the room you do have and set a hard limit – one shelf, one bag, one bin. Then when you hit that limit, force yourself to purge and donate, use, or toss the overflow.
  4. Make it convenient. One of the biggest mistakes crafters make is creating a beautiful, eye-pleasing organization design that is less than simple to use. If your materials aren’t easily accessed, then you are going to face barriers to practicing your craft. You’re not going to want to drag the ladder over to the attic crawlspace and heft out a 27-pound Tupperware container each time you feel like whipping up a birthday card.
  5. Organize the way you work. When you’re designing a necklace, do you look for charms according to theme, size, color, or material? If you’re quilting, do you search for fabrics by remnant size, color, print, or material content? However you think about your supplies, that’s how you should organize. Yes, buttons sorted by color look fantastic on your shelf, but if your natural inclination is to look for embellishments by size, you’re going to be very frustrated.

Organizing your crafting supplies is not just a fun and enjoyable part of your crafting, it can also lead to other positive outcomes. When you start examining how you work and how you think about your supplies, you’ll naturally start developing a more streamlined process. You’ll learn which products and tools you use most often, and you may even discover materials you forgot you had! Organizing is well worth the time you put into it, whether you’re working on a TV tray or a custom studio.

About today’s guest blogger:

Learn more about Lain Ehmann.


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