Organising Fabric

My latest organising project has been in my new laundry, organising my fabric.  I am pretty excited that this is a peek at what my cupboard now looks like!

But first, any good organsing blog needs a 'before' photo.  I previously had my fabric stored in plastic snap-lock bags.  In my old laundry, I kept them all in a few boxes, and never knew what I had.  In the renovated laundry, I tried to line up the snap-locks on a shelf in the cupboard, in order to be able to see what I had.  Unfortunately, it just didn't look as visually appealing as I had hoped, nor did it allow me to clearly see all of my fabric, as the smaller bags slid down behind the big bags.

As per usual, the first place that I looked for inspiration was Pinterest.  You can see my Sewing Room board here. Almost immediately, I came across this picture and I absolutely fell in love with!  It is just beautiful...

http://thisismeinspired.blogspot.com/2011/05/mission-reorganization-fabric-storage.html

I searched online for these amazing boards that the fabric was wrapped around, but soon worked out it was going to cost me around $200 to get a box of them sent here from America!  So, my search continued...

I then found this option:



http://smashedpeasandcarrots.blogspot.com/2010/11/mini-fabric-bolts-and-some-studio.html

Underneath the fabric?? Comic book boards!  And soon after, I found them on ebay (here).  I measured my cupboard to make sure that I was maximising the space that I had available, and ordered the 'Magazine' sized boards, as these were slightly larger, and would still easily fit on my shelf.  They cost $18.75 plus $12.99 postage.  So, for a little over $30 I had my new storage solution delivered to my door.

I will admit that I was expecting the boards to be a little sturdier, however I knew they would do the job.  For the larger quantities of fabric, I used 2 or 3 boards together, to increase the overall strength.

Maggie (from the second 'pinspiration' picture) does a fabulous step-by-step guide on how to fold the fabric onto the boards, which you can see here.  I actually folded mine under at the top and bottom too, and then pinned them at the back. 

I spent two hours neatly folding my fabric onto the boards, and voila - this is my new fabric stash!!

I even have my wad of spare boards standing on the end, beside the white fabric.  This will ensure that I keep this system going, by having the boards nice and handy anytime I go to put fabric away.

And up the top of the cupboard, I have a few Ikea boxes, which I still need to label.  They hold:

- small fabric scraps (two boxes of these)

- fur, feathers and felt (for crafting)

- sewing projects to be completed (eg - set of fabric, zip and button that I have bought for something specific, but never made it)

There is clearly oodles of space left in the cupboard, which means I have plenty of room to add to my collection over the coming years.

Not only does my cupboard look super-organised now, but I can now clearly see what I have.  This is certainly going to save me money, as I can check my own supply for any future projects and use what I have, rather than going to the shop and buying something new.  And it is very space-saving, as before this, I had the two shelves completely stuffed with bags of fabric!

Now, off to sew the waistband on a brown satin skirt I found that I had never finished ;)

Read more about My Laundry Make-Over here.

I am linking up with The Organised Housewife's Love It, Like It, Link It Blog Link Party!