Irregular shaped bottles of varying sizes, shades and styles – nail polish.
You can’t stack ’em, slot ’em together and there’s only one way up for them! No wonder they give me a headache.
I have around 208 bottles that were literally overflowing their allotted space in the stackable drawers I’d bought from Asda. It was time for them to move house…
Into a brand new Ikea Helmer!
Oh, Ikea Helmer… you are the stuff of makeup-lover’s dreams. Perfectly sized, you’re small enough to be considered compact yet spacious enough to hold our treasures within your functional (but not too officey) exterior!
The Helmers comes in white, red or silver and are priced at just over £20 each. I own two white Helmers and they hold SO much crap it’s astounding.
If I’m completely honest though, I lust after an Alex:
But at over £80 a-piece, the price difference is hard to justify.
Here’s a quick phone snap of my polishes all snug and comfy in their new home. Look how perfect they are, all divided by colour and standing to attention!
But my favouritest thing about their new home? It means I now have plenty of space for more!
How do you store your nail polish – do you own a Helmer?
I’m off to Ikea tomorrow to buy a couple of Helmers, they’re the way forward! I looked at Alex too but yeah cant justify the £80 compared to £20. Hopefully my nail polishes will be as happy as yours! xx
That’s what I use to store mine, but I need to find some sort of divider/sectioning thingy so I can find colours a bit easier (I have my sorted by colour at the moment, but it’s all a bit of a mess).
Wow! That’s quite a collection of polishes =D
Mine are in a box that I got a Body Shop gift set in at Christmas. It’s lined up by colour so I can see how many similarly-coloured purple polishes I have, whoops.
I’ve told myself my collection can’t get any bigger than that because I’m going to be working in a hospital in the future so no nail polish allowed! 🙁 (I really should have thought this through before deciding on my career path…)
Looks like a lot of people use the Helmer for nail polish storage! Fortunately I don’t own that many nail polishes… yet.
I have an ikea set of office drawers (not the helmer) that isn’t tall enough (or spacious enough) for all my makeup and polishes. I get annoyed at my D&G polishes – packaging is gorgeous, but they’re too tall! Even OPI I can’t stand up in my current storage. The Helmer looks great and is really well priced. I need to reconsider my storage as I want it more organised.
So jealous, I want a Helmer but they are $129 here is Australia & I just can’t justify one. The Alex is ever worse at $300, Australian pricing is the worst.
Bah – I too want a Helmer (and will be soon buying one) but they are AU$79 here (which is 51 pounds!) instead of the AU $31 dollars that 20 pounds translates too….everything (inc nail polish and cosmetics) in Australia is double the price of US & UK – never fails to annoy me:(
I have mine in a Helmer as well. Have around 500, so its pretty full 🙁 I chose the grey one 😀
I recognize all your polishes from photo- mostly by bottle designs
I store my 20-odd polishes ina little box on mmy windowsill
I recognize all your polishes from photo- mostly by bottle designs
I store my 20-odd polishes ina little box on mmy windowsill
I kind of want an Alex of my own, actually, but I don’t have that much polish yet!
Slightly under 700 bottles in two Helmers:)
Oh my god this is amazing! I gotta get to Ikea this weekend. This is going to help me organize my stash of polishes:)
I started with two Helmers, and have since added two Alex’s! Alex’s are so worth it.
My mind boggles at the number of polishes everyone has- my own meager stash of 10 is in a wicker basket in my clothes cupboard! Mind you, my hubby would flip if I bought all the polish and cosmetics I am tempted by…;)
£20? That’s a pretty decent price. I’d love to buy one, but have you seen how incredibly tiny my room is? “Box” doesn’t cut it, once you’ve got my bed and my wardrobe the remaining space couldn’t hold a postage stamp…
Oooh, what a bargain! I put my polish in one of those WH SMith storage boxes, but a lot of my polishes are too tall so either lie down and roll around or are located in various little boxes all over the place.
I dislike going to Ikea though. Last time I went I took me about 10 mins to find the entrance! Who puts it on the top floor? Lol! 🙂
FragrantWitch, you and I are in the same boat. I have only half a drawer of polish, and I’ve been giving away some of the bottles I rarely use because I felt I had too much!
my 30 bottles are just stuffed in a makeup bag….It’s quite full right now which prevents me from getting more nail polishes…. it’s a good thing 🙂
I use a helmer for my nail polish. It’s nowhere near full, but it’s such a cute little storage device.
I keep mine in a cutlery tray in my dressing table drawer. I have a fear of them falling over and leaking so the cutlery tray gives protection and divides colours and base coat etc. Like the look of the Helmer.
My polishes go into a vanity case my aunty bought me years ago. The rest are dotted around somewhere. I do not have that much. Though the Helmer looks like it would be a problem solver for me. I could use it to store my makeup and then just have a small traincase for my everyday wears. I hope the folk at Ikea wont find me weird if when I go I bring a few makeup and try them in the drawers. My version of try before you buy.
Great idea for storage. now I have a new excuse to go Ikea.
Is it wrong to want the Helmer for my pityful 12 bottles of nail polish?!
Did the pink dividers come separately from Ikea?
x
No, I bought the dividers seperately from Deal Extreme… they’re not brilliant but they do the job!
Eee, thank you SO much for posting pics of this! I’d been wondering if an Ikea helmer would be big enough to hold my makeup collection – if it can fit 208 polishes, then it certainly can! Thanks, a HUGE help!
I use sturdy cardboard photo storage boxes. The polishes all stand up perfectly in them. At this point I separate them by brand and just finished painting all of my nail wheels to make a list/ road map for them. One of these days though I would love to get a Helmer!
Great Idea! I will investigate 🙂 x
Oooh! Now I want a Helmer. My nail polishes are taking over the fridge!
Yay more space. I want a helmer but i currently store my nail polishes in a container 😀
I had 2 Helmers and upgraded to an Alex (the shorter, wider one with 6 drawers) and I couldn’t be happier. You can only put polishes/lipsticks in the bottom 3 drawers because the top 3 are a little shallower, but all my drawers are filled and I don’t have an issue with the drawers falling out, which happened a lot with my Helmers.
Maybe when Leila needs a desk you can give her your Helmers and replace yours with Alex?
I thought I was the only one who used this for nail polish. Mine is red.
I actually have the Alex and I’m so glad. But then I’ve got a hell of a lot more stuff to put in it because doing nails is how I make my living, I’m a fully trained nail technician.
Having said that, I would have totally opted for the Helmer if I couldn’t have had the Alex.
I have a red helmer to store my nail polish in. It’s great! I have an Alex as well the tall white one and the shorter black one. I love them all. Great storage solutions.
I use neat little pouches which enable me to seperate my colours and keep them safe and securely in my case, draw or cupboard.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UDlsYflHdc
I have a Helmer and it’s filling up nicely….did look for the Alex when in IKEA the other day but couldn’t find it. Why is it better??
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