Craft Supply Organizer

As I mentioned in a prior post, I have acquired quite the collection of arts and crafts supplies over the years and my storage solution has been a college-style plastic drawer that is just bursting at the seams. When I came across a supply organizer I knew I had to make my own immediately. This project cost me nothing, used up things I would have just thrown in the recycling bin and forced me to organize all of my supplies! Win, win, win!

Supplies:

Cardboard boxes

Thicker cardboard or piece of wood

Paper (I used canvas paper)

Hot glue and glue gun

Sobo glue (or any craft glue)

Packing tape

Utility knife

Paint (optional)

The holidays left our box collection pretty abundant, so I picked out some of the smaller sized ones.

Then using a Sharpie, I marked where I was going to cut the boxes. I wanted mine to be a bit more sculptural so I opted for the diagonal cuts.

I made sure to re-secure all of the boxes, first with glue...

then with packing tape on any of the seams.

Here is my layout. I went through my mental library of what supplies I had and tried to configure the boxes in the most useful way.

So here comes the slow part of this project; all of the boxes need to be covered with paper of some sort. I knew I wanted to paint the whole thing once it was done, so I used Canvasette (a canvas paper). 

Using the Canvasette, I covered the front, sides and bottom, making sure to leave flaps on the sides and bottom where it will be glued down to the backing, in my case a piece of plywood. I also left a flap on the front to fold over the inside.

That fluff ball is Mr. Wizard and he was very interested in this project! What is it with cats and boxes? He must think I'm making him a climbing wall/bunk bed.

Time for paint! I used gesso to coat the insides of the boxes, giving them a more uniform look.

I also gave the plywood two coats of gesso.

Finally gluing the boxes to the plywood!

All in place and ready for their final coat of paint!

I decided to paint the back one color and the boxes a different color so I used my triangle to mark where the change in color would be.

I chose black for the backing so it would hide the glued on flaps the best and give it a sleeker look.

Then I went with a grayscale for the boxes.

So happy to have my supplies organized and on display for easy use! Once it is loaded up, this thing can get pretty heavy, so if you plan on mounting this on the wall, just make sure to get some sturdy anchors. 

--Heather