This week I’m on vacation. While I’m gone I’m showing off my new super-tidy sewing room, and sharing my solutions to some common craft supply storage challenges. On Tuesday I shared how I store and organize all my favorite sewing tools. Yesterday I showed you my embroidery thread. Today I’m going to show how I store all my fabric – including scraps.
I store most of my fabric under my main work table in plastic milk crates.
I divide it by color. . .
- red
- orange and yellow
- green
- blue
- purple
- browns and tans
- black, white and grey
I also have one crate that holds works in progress. By that I mean things I’m really and truly making progress on – not unfinished objects that are just piling up somewhere that I’ll never get back to. 🙂
So that’s for regular woven cottons. I keep other fabrics under the other side of the table.
The bins on the right side hold polar fleece, cuddle fleece, satiny fabric that makes good ear linings, and tulle that makes good tutus. That’s a roll of batting and my cuddle fleece color swatches rolled up between the bins.
The right side holds my colored backdrop paper for photo shoots (top shelf), painted paper for making cards for Jo (middle shelf), and some more paper, a basket of felt scraps, and my stuffing tub on the bottom shelf.
Now – about scraps. . .
I used to have twice this space devoted to scraps. Now it’s just these three bins, sorted by color. I have one for warm colors, one for cool colors, and one for neutrals.
I went on a bit of a scrap quilt binge last year and realized the six bins I was using had enough scraps in them to make three quilts – and have more than half left over. I do NOT need enough scraps for six quilts, so I pared down what was left, got rid of the ugly stuff and the too-small pieces, and this is what I have left. When the bins fill up (like they are now) I need to make another scrap quilt.
So that’s how I store all my fabric – including my scraps. 🙂
Tomorrow – pins and needles.
Best,
Wendi
Where did you get the tables that you store the fabric?
I got them at Home Depot. They’re pretty basic work benches and the shelves are super strong.
Thanks for sharing your system. My mother is a textile archivist and she is adamant that I store my fabric in bins with holes and/ or without lids on them. This makes a different for the natural fiber ones, really, and not for fleece, etc. I also try to go through each bin regularly and refold the pieces with a different direction to account for creasing and light fading.
I do keep most of my fabric on the darker side of the table – the one that doesn’t get direct sunlight. It’s amazing how quickly it can fade!
Love the way you have organized your room, but I am envious of the space! Wow! My sewing area is about 9 square meters, and I keep almost everything in there, except for my batting.
I have a comment about the threads I see in the background. are you aware of that if they are exposed to sunlight (or do you have great lighting, the rooms seems very well lighted) they will age and eventually change color? I had mine the same way, but relized that I was destroying them in the sunlight coming through my window. I solved the problem by getting two cheap but nice looking metallic drawer units from IKEA, where I keep all my thread. I do recommend them as he colors have stayed the same ever since! The units are called HELMER and are really easy to put together!
Regards from Agneta in Sweden (not working at IKEA though
Thanks! I’ll look for those the next time I’m at Ikea. I do love having them out and easy to grab, though. And I like seeing the pretty colors. 🙂