Centre of my world: How I organised my makeup

It's blatantly indicative of my priorities in life when the rest of my room lies in shambles, but the one spot of order is my vanity. I'm someone who cannot feel at home or happy until I've personalized my living space. In the time I've left, my room was rearranged, my precious books placed in storage, and it was used as a guest room and storage space. What remnants of myself I could still see, were of a self that I'd left behind two years ago and had no wish to return to.

The me I was then would have moped and been unhappy, daunted by the overwhelming task of redecorating an entire room. However, two years of moving in and out of hostels has taught me a thing or two. I believe in Frances Mayes advice, "Take one place and make it yours. Then go through the rest slowly..."

I, of course, started with my makeup. Here's what I did.

I knew I wanted something hardy, durable, and pretty because I was going to use it everyday. So I went to my second home while in Malaysia, Ikea (lol.. yes I know its Swedish), and found a wooden mini chest of drawers for RM49. It's solid and sturdy, so although the drawers stick a bit, it's heavy enough that the entire thing doesn't move when I yank. Be warned if you want to go this route that it does take some assembly involving screws and nails.

Since I have the artistic kill of say... my beagle... I bought lovely decorative paper to decoupage onto the outside of the box instead. The incredibly lovely paper I found is from a scrapbooking shop in The Curve called Papier. After cutting and pasting, I gave the entire thing a spray of clear shellac so that it would be hardy and I could wipe it clean easily.

Right, now the arts and crafts are over. I used a really deep drawer organiser I found in Ikea for RM5 to go on top of the chest (*edit: Just realised it's the SAME as the ones Tine used!). In it I placed my brushes, daily toiletries, and the eye and face makeup I use on a daily basis.

In the top long drawer, I placed shallow partitioned plastic containers to sort out my glosses and lipsticks. As you can see, Silk Naturals lippies got a little section all to themselves!

The three little drawers in the middle are perfect for mineral makeup. L-R are Blushes, Eyeshadows and Foundations. No, the alphabetized organisation is NOT deliberate. It was subconscious. Sometimes, I scare myself.

The bottom drawer is for my compacts, and this is where my marvelous chest falls short. It's too shallow to stand most compacts up, so they have to be placed flat and stacked on one another. One day I'll probably get a small drawer set meant for CDs and craft it onto a perfect makeup compact storage unit. Until then, this will have to do.

The chest is sitting on an ugly glass-fronted cabinet which holds my stock-piled makeup, bath & beauty products..etc. Sorting it out, and making it pretty will probably be my NEXT project!

So, has starting with this worked for me? Yes it has. Because everything I need to feel fully dressed is right there where I need it, sorted and organised, I had the strength to unpack all my books. (Yes, that needed strength. There are LOTS of books.) Which in turn gave me the fortitude to take on the rest of my room. It's almost just as I'd like it now. =)

For more makeup organizing ideas, check out ParisB's and Tine's solutions. How do you girls sort your makeup? Do tell, I looooooove organization tips.