Makeup Organization

Hi, friends!

I got a request to do a post about how I store and organize my makeup, so here we are! Hopefully this is helpful and inspires you to organize something today. :)

Forgive the random brushes laying on the desk; I haven't quite figured out the best way to store/display the magical wand brushes that a friend gave me for my birthday! I use my old phone as a fancy MP3 player for music as I get ready, so it lives over there, too.

Before I get started, I want to say that I know my collection seems excessive. I do have more makeup than I probably "need" to as an average human and non-MUA. However, nearly all of the products are super inexpensive and a good chunk of them were bought at a discount and/or with a gift card. I also watch review videos and seek out several honest opinions before deciding to buy something.
Like I mentioned before, makeup is a hobby for me, which means I do a lot of experimenting. Instead of sticking to the same one or two everyday looks, I use colors that match what I'm wearing or what mood I'm in. I couldn't have put Black Widow's symbol on my eyelids when we saw Infinity War if I hadn't had black shadow, white concealer, and red shadow. It is a lot of stuff, but every product has its own uses.
Some people collect baseball cards; I apparently collect pretty things to put on my face.
(Also, if you see something that looks like dust, it's almost definitely just setting powder.)

My philosophy when it comes to organizing things is the old proverb "A place for everything and everything in its place." This is how I am with my kitchen, closet, laptop files, bookshelves, and as many of Jared's things as I can get away with. (One of these days, he'll come home from work and find that his clothes have mysteriously been organized.) The most helpful strategy for organizing cosmetics is having specific places to keep them.

Amazon is where I've bought all of my acrylic organizers, but that's mostly because if I wanted to buy them in a physical store, I'd need to either limit myself to what the local Walmart has available or drive 90 miles to a real city. (Small, isolated towns make shopping... interesting.) I'll share links to the specific organizers I use and give you an idea of the kinds of things I use them for.

Drawers
This particular kind comes in a bunch of different styles. Mine has four drawers and another piece that can sit on top in a groove. The top part has a bunch of slots for lipstick and some open, generic holding areas.

The drawers house a lot of my smaller items. They're great for holding compact eyeshadow palettes and single shadows.

These drawers get shuffled around and reorganized occasionally. This is the current setup.

Because of the way my desk is laid out, I keep the two parts separate, but I used to have them stacked. In the top, I have a whole bunch of lipstick, as well as concealer, mascara, and everyday/essential brushes.

You'll notice a lot of items from e.l.f. and Wet N Wild in these pictures. Their products are (generally) about as inexpensive as makeup can get. Huzzah!

Brush storage
Instead of buying an official brush holder, I cleaned out jars that once held strawberry jam, put some plastic beads inside, and stuck my brushes in them. Simple, decently cute, and extremely cheap!

The jar on the right still has its label.

Palette organizer
This is technically an office sorter intended to hold important papers. Oh, well. It works wonderfully as a tool to display and contain my eyeshadow palettes. (This is something that the average makeup user isn't likely to need.)

Here we see the two most expensive makeup products I own: Too Faced's Chocolate Bar and Sweet Peach palettes. I bought both secondhand (but unused) for much less than the original cost. They smell amazing.

Miscellaneous stuff container
Every house has a drawer of random stuff, pencils, and probably a few of those tab things that hold bread bags closed. This is kind of my makeup desk's equivalent of that drawer. I made it by cutting a juice bottle and filing the sharp edges away. Not the most beautiful container I could've used, but it does its job and is mostly hidden anyway.

Various brushes and some pencil eyeliners live here.

Assorted lip product holder
Another repurposed thing. I honestly forget what this originally held because I've been using it to house lip glosses and such for two or three years now. It holds the kinds of lip products that aren't super stable when put into a normal lipstick slot and some overflow from the official lipstick holder.

NYX products can be a little pricey, but they go on sale pretty frequently and those glosses are really nice.

Official lipstick holder
Not much to say about this. It's super cheap and keeps lip products in neat rows. You may notice that mine has a lot of unusual colors in it. Most of the "weird" colors live here and the more socially acceptable ones are in the top half of the drawer set or the old container next door.

The back row is My Little Pony glosses and the next row up is Infinity Stone glosses. Makeup and nerd merchandise are my two biggest financial weaknesses.

Lip liners and assorted eye products
Once upon a time, this container held some delicious frosting. These days, it's home to a bunch of lip liners, some eyeshadow sticks, and colored mascaras. I stuffed a tissue into the bottom to help the products be more accessible and I keep the eye and lip products separated with a notecard.

If you notice that my eyelashes are blue or purple, it's because of something from this frosting jar.

The spinning behemoth
Man, I love this thing. The shelves are adjustable and the whole thing rotates around, making it incredibly convenient. The way I have it set up, everything on the shelves is kept in general order of application. One quadrant has prep stuff (moisturizers, lip scrub), the next has base stuff (primers, foundation, setting powder), the third area has blush and highlighter, and the last section is contour and setting sprays.

Quadrant one

Quadrant two (ft. One Direction)

Quadrant three

Quadrant four

The top area is a lot more mishmashy. There's a few lip products, some liquid eyeshadows, straight-up glitter, eyeshadow pigments, normal eyeshadows, and my tube of actual white concealer.

Loose pigments and glitters with some lip products in the back

Liquid glitters and eyeshadows, two of the Wet N Wild dragon-themed eyeshadow quads, and tiny One Direction

More liquid eyeshadows, some single shadows, another Wet N Wild quad, liquid lipsticks

Single shadows and the Wet N Wild dragon-themed lipsticks

This concludes our tour of Lizzie's makeup desk. We hope you've enjoyed this journey! Please watch your step as you exit, and feel free to stick around a bit longer to ask questions or provide feedback. Have a sparkly day!

Love,
Lizzie