1.300+ nail polishes on swatch sticks organized in a new and super easy way, a Raaco cabinet

As my collection of nail polishes grow, so does the number of swatch sticks!
I previously showed you the idea I got with chains, that are so easy to use and open, see the old post right HERE
But I found a better way to store and organize my swatch sticks - click on the photos to enlarge them:

It is a Raaco 1260-00 cabinet, height 552 mm, width 306 mm and depth 150 mm. In this range of cabinets you find different sizes and with different numbers of drawers, as you can see further down I also have one half this size with 30 drawers. The depth is the same in all of them, but some have drawers slightly wider and broader, it's the final two digits in the product number, that indicates the size of the drawer. See the entire cabinet product range HERE in English - and HERE in Danish.
Use the Find a dealer page to see where you can get it, you should be able to get it all over Europe...
I chose to put a piece of tape on the front of some of the drawers and put colors from the nail polish color range in each row..

This is how I organized and store my chains until a year (and several polishes) ago.
There were several disadvantages, the worst was that several colors faded even if they hung out of reach from direct sun light. Also sometimes a chain opened when handling, and a bunch of sticks fell off, very annoying, so I temporarily used a not so good drawer system for storage.

But I love the drawers of the Raaco cabinet. The swatch sticks fit perfectly ind them. they are kept out of the light and dust, and each drawer can hold around 45 sticks before it's full.

OK, let's see how I organized the colors...

Here are the red drawers going from bright red to darker red - and the last two are the lighter and darker red magenta colors...

The pink going from a pale pink to the hot - some of the hots might belong among the magentas, it's not always easy to tell :)

The lilac/lavender colors - again going from pale to stronger.

- and the darker purples going from medium to darker and almost black purples. The last drawer is the "difficult to fence" purples ;)

And my very, very few pastel yellow polishes *cough, cough* - and a few orange ones... There will be sticks that might be well placed in the neighbor drawer too, it's difficult to tell when pale ends, and when less pale starts LOL

The mints going from pale to Tiffany box colors - and the last drawer is the super bright and intense mints.

The greens with more yellow than the mint range - going from spring leaf green to dark green, and the last drawer is neon's...

The turquoise and the teals.

The blue colors going from a pale pastel blue to dark blue.

The shimmers, flakies, glitter toppers, gold/copper/bronce metallics, glitters and holo's and the silver ditto.

White/cream, nudes, taupe/brown, grey and the black and charcoal.

And the cabinet for my Chanel polishes:

Let's take a look in the drawers:

The red's, brown-hued reds and the lilac/purples.

The pink range.

The peach/coral range and 3 yellows.

And white/cream, black/charcoal, blue, green and browns.

The nudes, silver/gold/copper/bronze and toppers.

The Dior nail polishes, Estee Lauder, YSL and a few other high end brands...

That's it - thanks for reading (or scrolling through ;) this lengthy post!
If you wonder how many polishes I have, see my complete stash list HERE...

Swatch sticks on chains are easier to arrange...

Click on photos to enlarge them - klik på fotos for at forstørre dem

I love swatch sticks, but hate rearranging them on the screws they come with, when I get a new polish! So after thinking of it a while, I came up with an idea!
As you can see, the red and purple swatch sticks are still on screws, but the rest I have moved to chains. It makes it SO much easier to add a swatch stick exactly where you want it within a range of color. You can open exactly whee you want, and you don't have to unscrew screws and remove a lot of sticks and replace them...
Jeg elsker swatch pinde, men jeg hader at omarrangere dem på de medfrølgende skruer hver gang jeg får en ny farve! Så efter at have spekuleret på en løsningen i nogen tid, kom ideen!
Som du kan se, er de røde og lilla farveprøver/swatch stick endnu på skruer, men resten er flyttet over på kæder. Det gør det SÅ meget enklere at tilføje en ny farve præcis der hvor du vil have den i rækken. Du kan åbne præcis det sted, og behøver ikke skrue skruer af, tage en masse farver af og sætte dem på igen...

 

It's the same kind of chain that some keyholders use. It's a simple ball chain with the lock used for that.
Det er den samme type kæde som anvendes til nogle nøgleringe, en simpel kuglekæde monteret med en lås.

You buy a long piece of chain, and then you cut off the pieces you need and fit it with a lock. I chose to cut them approximately 20cm long. Make sure that the chain and lock's diameter fit's in the hole of your swatch sticks!
I bought mine in Denmark, Cyberimport.dk in 2mm, but a 2.4mm chain probably works too. Perhaps a DIY jewelery shop where you live have it. It's a cheap solution, that makes things so much easier.
Bonus info, I buy my good quality swatch sticks here!
If you want clear ones, I'm told, that THESE are good, but i didn't try them myself. 
Du køber kæden i metermål, og så klipper du med en knibtang de ønskede stykker af og monterer låsen, jeg har valgt at klippe dem i ca. 20 cm stykker. Kæden og låsen skal kunne passere frit gennem hullet på swatch pinden. Jeg købte mine i 2mm hos Cyberimport.dk - jeg TROR også at en 2,4mm kæde fungerer. Under alle omstændigheder er det en billig løsning, der gør livet lettere.
Bonus info: Jeg køber de fantastisk gode swatch pinde her! De opløses ikke af neglelak som andre jeg har prøvet har gjort. 
Men hvis du vil have klare, så har jeg ladet mig fortælle, at DISSE er gode, men jeg har ikke selv prøvet dem.

Now the red and purple also are on chains - nu kom de røde og lilla også på kæde

 

My chains with swatch sticks often hang right in front of the metal suitcase that I polish and paint my nails on, or they are in the drawer right under it - see more in my  giveaway thread, where I show my my work space, click HERE.
Mine kæder med swatch pinde hænger ofte lige foran metalkufferten, som jeg maler mine negle på - eller også ligger de i skuffen lige under - se mere i min giveaway tråd, hvor jeg viser min private negle-arbejdsplads - klik HER.

A-England - my first 5 colors

Last week I got my first 5 a-England polishes, they are not going to be the last.
So far I only swatched them on my swatch sticks.The firsthand impression is very promising, it's a very nice formula to work with, some are practically one-coater's - and look at the colors!
I look forward to trying them, and I'll of course show them on the blog.
The only regret I have is, that I didn't buy Perceval!!
I sidste uge ankom mine første 5 a-England neglelakker, og de bliver ikke de sidste.
Ind til videre har jeg kun prøvet dem på mine swatch pinde. Førstehåndsindtrykket er særdeles lovende, det er dejlige lakker at påføre, de er stort set alle et-lags - og se bare de farver!
Jeg glæder mig til at afprøve dem rigtigt, skal nok vise dem på boggen!
Det eneste jeg fortryder er, at jeg ikke købte Perceval, når jeg nu var ved det!

Galahad is a gorgeous teal, actually more a petrol blue - er en smuk teal farve, faktisk mere en petrol blå...

Calmelot is a very pigmentet black, an one-coater I believe - black, black - det er en meget velpigmenteret sort, jeg tror man kan nøjes med et lag.

Lady of the Lake is a subdued holographic purple, but very, very nice. Det er en ikke voldsomt stærk holografisk lilla, men meget, meget smuk.

Avalon, where have you been all my life, you are so amazing!! - Avalon, hvor har du været hele mit liv, du er fantastisk!!

Guinevere, a dusty, greyish lavender/mauve, not overpowering and very stylish - det er en støvet, grålig lavendel/mauve farve, ikke dominerende, og meget elegant.

Do you like them, and do you own any of them?  Kan du li' dem - og har du nogen af dem selv?

Nail wheels, fans (disappointment) - or? Neglehjul, - vifter (skuffelse) - eller?

This fan looked like a very good idea, but the polish dissolves the plastic, so the polish looks terrible when it dries. - Denne vifte virkede som en rigtigt smart løsning, men plastikken opløses af neglelakken og resultatet er forfærdeligt grimt.

 

Dansk, se længere ned.

English: I started out using nail wheels for swatches of my nail polish colors to keep track of them. But I need to change my system because of my way too rapidly growing collection.

For this purpose I purchased a “fan” of nail sticks. I thought they would be great since you can take them of the screw they are mounted on, and put them other screws for color separation; one with reds, one with blues etc., etc. Also you can arrange them from light to dark, and always find a place for a new color among others of the same shade, and there is plenty of room on the handle to write the name of the polish.

You can see them here  

They arrived several weeks later, but sometimes mail from China is slow.

Today I decided to make the first swatches, but to my huge irritation the polish dissolved the surface of the plastic, so the polish dries rough and very bumby, as you can see. On the one farthest out on the left side, I swatched it underneath, and that was not all that bad. But then I tried it with a lighter color, and that did dry with some tiny cracks, so not really a perfect solution. Unfortunately a few days ago I ordered more, but in a white color, I really hope they are better.

So for the time being I’m back to square one, at least until the white fans arrive and I can check those out. Do you use wheels, fans or something quite else??

Dansk: På grund af min hurtigt voksende samling af neglelak, er jeg nødt til at ændre mit ”kartotek” fra de påbegyndte neglehjul, hvor jeg naivt troede at jeg f.eks. kunne have alle røde, rosa, pink og lilla på et hjul. Derfor købte jeg på Ebay en ”vifte” med plastnegle på stænger fra Kina (jeg måtte vente mange uger på dem), se linket her

Jeg syntes de måtte være ideelle, for de er monteret på en lang skrue and kan tages af og sættes på andre skruer. På den måde kan man altid sortere sine farver og indsætte nye hvor end de passer bedst i rækkefølgen indenfor den samme farve. Og det er let at skrive navnet på lakken på håndtaget – smart alt i alt…

Men i dag blev jeg noget skuffet og irriteret, for da jeg gik i gang med at lave farveprøver, opdagede jeg, at neglelakken opløste plastikkens overflade, og som du kan se på billederne, tørrede neglelakken med en hæslig ru og ruflet overflade – ØV

Jeg prøvede med en farve at lægge lakken på på undersiden, se den mørke længst til venstre, og det gik nogenlunde, men ved lysere farver ser man tydelig små ”revner” i lakken, brugbart, men ikke ideelt.

Desværre bestilte jeg for nogle dage siden flere, dog i den lyse cremefarve, som man også kan få neglehjul i. Nu må vi se, om de forhåbentlig er bedre, men lige nu er jeg tilbage på trin 1.

Bruger du neglehjul, vifte eller noget helt andet for at have et let overblik over dine farver?