Nail Polish Organization
There comes a time in every nail polish addict’s life where things become too cluttered and you lose track of all the things you have in your collection. When I got to that point a couple years back, I couldn’t help but organize every little bit of my collection because I’m a complete organizational freak! It took me a couple tries to figure out what worked best and what made it the easiest to find everything I needed with the least amount of effort. Today I want to share with you the organizational method that I have found to be the most convenient to arrange and store my nail polish. I won’t be listing each polish I have because I want to focus on the organizational side of things, but if you would like me to do that in another post, please let me know!
I did just go through my collection a couple weeks ago and throw out any that were old or close to being empty. When I did that, I also went through and reorganized everything the way I had it in the beginning so it would all be up to date. My first recommendation is to purchase a pack of nail wheels. I bought mine at Sally’s Beauty Supply ($5.99 for a pack of 10), but they also sell them on Amazon and in other stores. Each wheel has 18 nail tips for you to paint different colors. When I get a new polish or throw one out, it’s easy to take one nail polish off and repaint it with the new one.
My favorite way to organize the wheels is to have one for each shade range. So I have one for greens, blacks, grays/silvers, oranges, pinks, reds, blues, purples, glitters, and a misc. wheel for shades I only have one of. I love these wheels so much because it makes it easy to choose a color when you are able to hold it over your nail and really see how it’ll look. I don’t have a wheel for my white polishes or more neutral, skin tone type polishes because it’d be too hard for them to show up on such an opaque background.
I write a number on the back of each painted nail tip so I can further organize it and know which color is which. When painting the swatches, I paint two coats but don’t use a top coat. I don’t like using a top coat on the wheels because then I can see the original finish of a polish without the formula being manipulated by something on top of it. I also try to keep the colors from lightest to darkest on each wheel, but that can be difficult to maintain when adding in new colors.
With the numbers that I write on the back of the nail tips, I write what polish matches each number on these separate sheets of paper. You’ll notice that I also have each shade range organized on the paper with different colored markers. This just makes it easier on the eyes when matching them up. On the paper, I write the brand name first and then the polish name because it’s more convenient for me when I go to grab it off of my shelf.
This is what all of the polish looks like when it’s stored on the shelf in my beauty room. I bought the rack on the right from Claire’s a couple years back and the one of the left from Icing about a year ago. I couldn’t find either of them on the websites, but I think they were around $15 if you find them in stores. I love having these holders because it makes storage so much easier and more presentable. I store them by brand because that’s what’s easiest for me and sometimes when I’m choosing a polish, I may be looking for brands that I know have a long wear time and organizing them all in this way helps a lot with that.
I know this may seem a little confusing and complicated at first, but please don’t hesitate to ask questions or let me know if there is anything I can clarify for you. I hope this gave you some inspiration for organizing your own collection. Have a beautiful day!!
