Makeup storage: the reason clear plastic shelving, that is somehow deceptively small, can be priced at upwards of £15 even on websites like amazon and aliexpress. Even the little paper desk tidies have spiked significantly. I’ve spent a lot of time in the last few months or so looking at the various options available to me, watching far too many makeup storage videos on youtube (the size of some peoples’ collections is honestly intimidating) for inspiration and recommendations.

I decided around the middle of December that I was going to get the best value for money for pretty decent quality from Ikea; sturdy, minimal upkeep, reliable products, and I can take it back if it isn’t right, I don’t like it, or if there are any problems in the future really easily.

My collection isn’t anywhere near big enough for the Alex drawers, and I doubt it’ll get to that point for a while, so preemptively buying for some distant future felt a little counterproductive. My search was centred around something that would sit on top of my desk quite nicely without taking up too much room, considering the setup it would be replacing was basically a product sprawl. Not cute. Or effective, really, I could see everything but it was just a mess to look at.

I did consider getting some of the clear plastic shelving, or white plastic shelving. Most of the bigger, more storage related furniture in my room is white, and the walls are a light lilac, so I’ve been trying to keep a fairly light colour scheme with anything I’ve added, and white or clear would’ve worked best than anything like black coloured from a plastic point of view. However a lot of the more decently, reliably sized plastic storage is really expensive, to the point where you might as well just buy glass for durability, so I quickly axed that idea and thought wood would be the best way to go.

With the Alex drawers ruled out, I found the Moppe mini chest of drawers in the storage solutions/desktop storage section of the Ikea website. They’re perfect if you’ve got a small to perhaps the smaller side of medium collection? Sizes are relative in this game, but I definitely have growing room with these should I want it. The dimensions are 42x18x32cm; so the width across the front (42cm) is a little less than the width (or depth) of my desk; the height (32cm) makes it suitable to stack or sit things on top; and the depth (18cm) is pretty decent for fitting palettes or longer tubed products in.

The version I got is the most expensive, £18, and it comes with 6 drawers: 3 small across the top tier, 2 across the middle, and one along the bottom. You can also get the moppe with 4 or 6 drawers of equal size, but I felt that this configuration would work best for me and storing makeup, as you can assign drawers to products types with a little more wiggle room for variety.

For instance: I store eyeshadows and palettes in the largest drawer, as the singles are easy to see and there’s more room to root through palettes; the right middle drawer is for base products, cushion compacts, bb creams, concealer, primer; the left middle drawers is for liquid lipsticks and my more nude/browner shades; the top left drawer is for red and pink lipsticks; top middle is highlight and blush; top right is brows and mascara. I store eyeliners in a pot, and brushes in a personalised pouch that both sit on top of the moppe drawers,

If that seems a little odd, I have 3 brow products and 3 mascaras, and giving them an individual segment was too much, whereas I have really increased the number of lip related items I own in the last year, and separating them by my mood (I’m either in a nude mood, or a pink/red mood) was most natural for me.

other plus points for the moppe mini chest of drawers

– made of untreated birch plywood – sturdy but light enough to move around easily. Can be customised easily

– relatively inexpensive for the quality – the smaller 4 & 6 drawer models are £10 and £15 respectively

–  it’s not flatpack! I was mildly dreading having to potentially put it together, but it’s one of the smaller options so it’s a pick up and carry/go. No screwdriver necessary.
–   you don’t have to wipe down the wood for fingerprints every time you open a drawer

downsides of the moppe mini chest of drawers

–  you might want to line the drawers with paper or some fabric to keep the wood clean, or have an extra layer between the base of the drawers and your products
–  sometimes the drawers are a little hard to slide in and out (vaseline does the trick though!)
–  it’s wood, so you can’t see your products in the drawers

In the way of makeup storage, I think this little chest of drawers is a fab alternative to plastic or paper/card units. Considering the smaller versions are also fairly inexpensive, if you needed something larger than this, but like the size, I’d imagine they’d look quite nice stacked, or arranged on top of one another along a vanity cabinet or desk.

If the clear plastic organisers are still more your cup of tea, Primark have started doing a small range of their own for about £4, if you’re not quite up for spending ££ on the item plus shipping!

How do you store your products? Are you an Alex drawer unit, other IKEA storage, or a fan of the clear organisers? Let me know, I’ll probably be adding little bits to my own setup as it grows…

♥

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