How I Organized My Nail Polish, Part 2
Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010
Organized chaos!
How I Organized My Nail Polish, Part 2
Over the weekend, I decided it was time to re-organize my nail polish stash and put it back to rights! (The last time I did this was almost exactly six months ago!) I’m still using the exact same method: Clear Storage Boxes from The Container Store–shoe box size. (I also use all of the various sizes of the clear storage boxes for *everything*!) I thought I’d share an update, since I know some of us enjoy a peek into each other’s stashes. 
The way I started was by pulling bottles from one brand at a time, lined them all up, and then sorted them by color on the floor. After I’ve sorted by brand and color, I put each one (standing up) in the container. Depending on how full the container is, if there is any room for the polishes to slide around, I fold up a piece of bubble wrap and place it along the side. I also turn some bottles upside down to fit the last few remaining of the brand in the same box, too. I stack all of the filled containers on top of each other, about eight high (around four feet in height).
For brands that I don’t have too many shades of, then I try to combine them with similar-shaped bottles or brands. Barielle, Dashing Diva, and Duri have very, very similar bottle shapes, so I keep those together. I keep my higher-end polishes like Chanel and Dior together as well. I also keep base, fast drying, and top coats separate (along with other treatment products) in a separate container so I can easily access them as I need to.
I know that a lot of people have found Ikea Helmers to work well for storing nail polish, but I don’t have a good place for them in my apartment, and I don’t really dig the look and feel myself. Maybe one day when I have more room, I’ll be able to find a classier organization system! My dream is to have California Closets re-do a room and give it a freestanding beauty and makeup organization makeover…
See more photos…
Sorted by color… (Essie)
Essie (so pretty!)
SpaRitual
OPI
MAC
Orly
Designer (Chanel, Dior, etc.)
Barielle, Dashing Diva, Duri
Zoya (excludes a case already sorted by color)
Zoya
Nubar
China Glaze
China Glaze
Ta-da!
Thank you so much for this article! I am revamping my storage and organization for my polishes and on the lookout for something that would work with my taller polishes. These Container Store boxes look like the trick and lucky me there is a sale on! :)
Mine is this plus more - I just don't know what to do with them all - esp the old ones that are collector items since I am older than most who are on blogs - I have bottles of OPI back to the very start of the company in the late 80's and some CND's which we never called CND back then - it was always Creative then - that are pre OPI days. I have purged a # of times getting rid of a ton and all 'off or drug store brands.' Now I find with the blog world, and looking at the secondary market of never used polish, how valuable some of this stuff is, I cannot bear to take mine to the local toxic recycling or give trash bags full to teens down the street to go through. I am in a huge qualm as to what to do. I have to thin down so that if I need to move, I really could do it in a period of 1 month - right now, I could never make it.
You could try MUA - I'm sure people would love to grab those HTFs!
Wow, and I thought I had a lot of nail polish. I always just piled them in bins, now Ive decided its time to get organized. Might try your way, or just get a nail polish rack. Not sure!
I have 108 OPI nail polishes. I organize them in this way: http://katerinashutova.blogspot.com/2010/12/my-opi-nail-lacquers.html
Oh my goodness. You must have over 200 nail polishes!
I love nail polish and im going into cosmotogy i love beauty, im colecting nail polish, i have 562, so im working on getting more, i just love it!
Ohhhhhhhhhhh my god, thats the most beautyfull thing i have ever seen hihihi!! I love nailpolish, i wish i had all those colours... Sorry if my English is not totally right (i'm from Holland) What is your ultimate favorite nailpolish ever?? xxx Ilja
For Audrey by China Glaze!
This totally made all my OCD nerves tingle (happily). And my inner child squealed with glee at the pix of all the pretty colors. Double score!
OMFG :O
Sooo pretty!!!! I expected a lot more OPIs for some reason. Where do you store your Milani polish? 669 is incredible. How many of them have you tried on more than once? Are there any that you hate and would probably never wear again?
Milani is in there somewhere :) I don't have many Milanis, actually. I don't keep track of what I wear or not, lol! It's a little hard to do so :P I really just wear what's recent more than anything else! I can't think of any that I hated really, but again, it's hard to remember!
Oh I see how you sort it out. My nail polish collection looks nothing like yours. Mines is so messy and the bottles are all different shapes and sizes... so it's kind of hard for me to organize it. I guess I should of thought about before I purchase them! Great Nail Polish Collection by the way!!
Your collection of nail polish is very drool worthy! <3
Oh my goodness, you have more polish than a nail salon could ever want
All the colors look so pretty organized together (:
you have enough polish to paint a house ;)
MAYBE a room! No way a house, lol!
Amazing collection!! I bought several china glaze nail polishes, but there aren't enough days for me to wear all of them.. I always end up painting my nails with for audrey or re-fresh mint
Personally I am shocked that your Chanel logos are not all facing the same way :P
LOL! I have the labels facing the same direction, but I guess the tops don't quite align when you do it that way!
Ahhhhhhh, so much polish! I keep mine in an Ugg box under my bed No organization whatsoever.
oh my god. i ithought i had a lot of polish wit my collection of 400. But this is beautiful!
OMG! How many nail polish! I've got only 6 colors ^_^. Do you finish them or throw away when it thickens?
If I find out it's thickened and want to use it, then I'll try thinner first :)
Thank you so much for posting Christine! My nail polish needs some organizing, and you just gave great tips!
that's a lot of nail polish! i only wish to have that big of a collection someday!
I'm in complete awe. It's like nail polish happiness land :B Essie bottles are my fave, so pretty.
:_( :_( :_( buhuaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Why in Italy they are not importing the 99% of those brands? :_(
Do you have four bottles of For Audrey in there?
Oh, you already answerd. But dang!
I think it's five or six!
oh my, you have so many! =) ever tried butter london? would love to see a review on them if you ever do=)
I have two from Butter London :)
***faints***
I want to go to your house and try out all of those nail polish....they look really lovely. I love them all
ah the essies look SO pretty
*Rubbing my eyes* wow Christine, I lauve ur collection.Is China glaze ur fave brand?
Yes!
This looks amazing! It looks like a store display -so organized.
Holy stash batman! I have like... 12 nailpolishes total. They're all drugstore brands too. I'm sincerely jealous XD
JEEZ! I have like 20 bottles at most! Do you buy all of those? Or are they sent for post consideration? I've stopped buying so much polish, because what usually happens is I wear it once, then get bored of it. I've resorted to frankenpolish to recycle my old colors ^_^
It's a mix - some I've bought, some are sent!
christine, is that three bottles of vestral white i see? i love the way the essie and china glaze bottles look en masse...
I think so, LOL! I had a few Nocturnelles, too.
not the most obvious shade to have doubles of (unless there is a special use i don't know of?)...i was so anxious to buy it the time it came out with antiquitease, but i think i only wore it once. :( it looks like liquid paper on me! LOL...
LOL! I think it's because it came out in special packaging at least once, so that would account for why I bought it again (I have a thing... I like everything to be the same in photographs - like I don't want to slip in a regular packaged product amongst LE packaged products). The other... because I forgot!
I know what you mean...I'm usually good at resisting special packaging for its own sake, but with the To The Beach shadows, I finally caved and bought Humid and Shimmermoss even though I had been telling myself to just buy the refill pans instead...Now I feel a need to keep them all together in my traincase or makeup bag...as though they're a little family! (And I can't even say it's because I'm photographing it...It's just ME who sees them...!)
Awwwww!! :)
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