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We talk a lot about work-appropriate hair on this blog… so if you're anything like me, you've probably amassed a pretty big collection of hair accessories. Maybe you use all of the pieces in your collection regularly, but for me, most of it just creates massive clutter. As someone who has no drawers in my bathroom and limited storage space in general, I've had to develop a few secrets for organizing my different hair and jewelry accessories. So I thought I'd share…
1. Use one doorknob in your home to hold extra ponytail bands. I tend to keep 4-8 on the inside bathroom doorknob, and I always know where to find one when I need it (and where to put them when I find them laying in random places around the house). (I'm talking about this kind of thing: Goody Ouchless Hair Elastics
.)
2. Tie a scarf in your closet vertically and clip those big claw clips
to it. I don't wear these often, but it always seemed like I was tripping over them elsewhere in my house. At the bottom, I tied a knot around the rolled-up sock I sometimes use for a sock bun.
3. (Especially if you're curly): Get a scarf or a fabric belt and use it to hold your Spin Pins, duck clips, bobby pins, and more. I've pictured mine — it's actually a belt from a robe that I never use, and the silky polyester is the perfect thickness for holding these things. I just tied it around one of the towel bars in my bathroom.
4. Store your favorite decorative hair accessories — ponytail ties, barrettes, and more — in a jewelry hanger in your closet, to keep them in sight but not in the way. For the really pretty ones it helps to remember what you've got. (Sorry for my shoddy photography: those are some of my favorite France Luxe hair ties, mixed in with some of my necklaces wrapped around business cards. This jewelry hanger on Amazon is similar: Household Essentials 80-Pocket Hanging Jewelry and Accessories Organizer, White Vinyl
.)
5. Use a large makeup bag to keep all of those other hair supplies that you buy and never use. I have so many different decorative pins, clips, sticks, etc… not to mention various “supplies” like bobby pins, etc. Some of them I bought years ago, some of them just weren't what I was looking for, some of them are things that I think I might be looking for in the future… On the rare occasion that I need to find something, I dump the whole thing out on my bed or table and hunt through it — but beyond that it's out of sight, out of mind.
Cat
I don’t have bathroom drawer space, but do have a cabinet. I keep small hair accessories that I use a lot (a few ponytail holders, bobby pins and clips that I use while flatironing) in a ziploc in the cabinet – easy to pull out and see everything, but the little items don’t get lost among the bottles and tubes.
AnonInfinity
I’m glad I followed the sock bun link. I totally thought you meant one of those ponytails that you put in a net bag thing, and I thought that didn’t seem like your style.
AIMS
I want one of those! Where does one get it?
Cb
I’m pretty sure my claw clips multiply and have little claw babies as I find them all over the house. It’s a good thing too as apparently I have difficult hair, I am constantly destroying clips and ponytail holders.
Natalie
Using a jewelry hanger is a great idea! Especially b/c it has so many little compartments to really separate everything. Great tips!
Natalie
ourstylefile.blogspot.com
Blonde Lawyer
Whenever I think I lost all my claw clips I look at my office desk and I usually find 12 plus a million hair elastics. Sometime mid afternoon I inevitably let my hair down and the hair accessories gather under my monitor stand.
Walnut
I appear to regularly shed bobby pins and earrings while at my desk.
Blonde Lawyer
I have earrings too. Never a pair. Just the one that I take out while on the phone and then forget to put back in. The most bizarre thing I had in my paperclip holder at one point was my belly button ring! I had bought a new one, realized I was allergic to something in it, closed my office door, took it out, and threw it in my paper clip holder. Why I didn’t throw it out I have no idea. It was in there for months till one day I reminded myself if I was allergic, I wouldn’t be using it again and chucked it out.
JenK
The the kind of thing I love to notice about myself, because it leads to an organizational system that I might actually use, as opposed to the myriads of “systems” that have been suggested.
Parker - Boardroombelles
My desktop organizers mini drawers have slowly been invaded by coins, lipsticks and hair accessories rather than office supples.
emcsquared
Hmmm…apparently the benefit of hair that defies accessories is that I don’t have to organize said accessories. I have a little dish on my dresser where I put bobby pins as I’m changing out of my work clothes, and another small organizer in a bathroom drawer where I put lingering hair clips and ponytail holders that got left over from a different hormone eon.
Sort of off topic – I really like the idea of working out in the soft headbands that wrap around the entire head (the ones that are just a big fabric or elastic circle, not the hard ones that end behind your ears). I have several of them, but can’t figure out how to wear them. They always slide toward the back of my head, scrunching my hair as they go until they make bunchy impromptu ponytails. Any advice, or is my head just not built for headband-wearing either (sigh)?
Cb
I have a hard time wearing them. I always have a hard time keeping bands in as well. I chalked it up to my weirdly round head.
Mountain Girl
Either this is an inherent problem with fabric headbands of we have the same head because I have no success wearing these sort of headbands either.
anon
I definitely have to wear them close to me hairline for them to stay in, but I. Usually using a headband like that to keep the wispies out of my face and have the rest pulled back in a ponytail.
Can you try bobby-pinning the headband in place, may just above each ear? Might help the migration.
Duchess
I do the same. Maybe 1″ from my hair line.
Elysian
I’ve had success bobby pinning headbands like you describe. I use four pins total, two near each ear.
For working out, I’ve had more luck with a full on bandanawrapped around my head. Since I can tie it really tight, it stays in better.
No Problem
I can’t keep elastic headbands on my head, either. Even the ones with rubber on the inside so they don’t slip. I keep chalking it up to my super soft and silky hair! But really, I’ve seen other ladies clip their headbands into place with bobby pins or those little oval-ish shaped snap clips. I haven’t tried that yet but I’m sure it helps.
FWIW, I use headbands when I work out in addition to a ponytail holder, since I have bangs and lots of little wispy strands that drive me nuts when they touch my face.
KateL
Check out sweatybands (or any of its copy-cats). It’s a double layer fabric upper lined with velveteen. They don’t slip – I ran a marathon in one of mine.
Lourine
Is there a good place to hang scrunchies? I have a lot of them but no where I can store them for easy access.
JenK
I bought a set of really cheap ponytail holders. They get stretched out immediately & aren’t that helpful BUT they came on a ring that looks sort of like a bracelet, except the ends are open, so you might call it one step of a spiral. Anyway, I slipped it over a towel bar in my bathroom and use it for those sorts of thing.
Miriam
I have something similar on my bedroom doorknob. I always know where my stash of pony holders are.
Parker - Boardroombelles
Inspired by my writing partner’s neat jewelry drawers, I recently re-organized my jewelry and hair accessories. For hair accessories, I use one of two of those small square Ikea Fabric boxes to hold my ponytail holders and hair donuts. I leave them open – that way I can easily reach in and grab what I need. Further, that way it is easy clip my duck clips and banana clips around the edges similar to how Kat clips them on the scarf. For jewelry, I just bought dozens of small hooks with double sided tape and a small piece of black fabric. On the inside door of my closet, I mounted the piece of fabric for my earrings with hooks. Then I mounted hooks for each necklace and bangle. Because I grouped them into categories the result was really neat looking. For statement necklaces using two hooks/necklace was actually a huge help, as I could fit more and they are actually on display the way they would hang on my neck. For earring studs I used small jewelry boxes and mounted them on the door with double sided tape also. Like with the hair ties, it was important to me that I can grab anything without first opening boxes or bags and have it all on display.
AIMS
I use a toolbox for all my random hair and non-daily beauty items. Like the kind you’d use for nails and screws. Similar to this: http://tinyurl.com/d2qg9dq
Mine is from Sears. All the small stuff can go where the different nails would go so it’s always easy to find stuff and the bigger stuff can fit underneath. It’s also easy to tuck it away out of sight under a vanity or in a closet when not in use. Plus, it reminds me of those Caboodles everyone had when they were 13. I loved those!
I also like those pretty decorative hat boxes to store some of the more random stuff that you can find in Homegoods and Marshall’s. They help make my clutter feel a bit more glamorous and intentional. I get different sizes and they’re great for loose ends. E.g., I have one for travel size beauty samples I may take on vacation; another for hats & gloves, etc.
Blonde Lawyer
Caboodles!!! I had one for my pencil collection and one for my eraser collection and one for my keychain collection . . . I was a cool kid . . .
SJR
I simply stack all my ponytail holders on the “tail” of my hair brush.
Amelia Pond
I put a magnet strip inside a drawer. So no more scatter pins or clips. They all stay stuck to the magnet! I can’t claim to have thought of this myself: I saw it on Pinterest
Honey Pillows
I still have my jeweled coordinating colored barrette from senior prom stashed in a makeup bag under the sink, but the only hair accessories I still regularly use are bobby pins, elastics, and headbands. I keep cotton squares and Q-tips in decorative glass jars on an antique tin tray in my bathroom, so I keep my bobby pins in a really short glass jar and my elastics in a vintage tea tin to coordinate. With the limited space in my bathroom, my policy has been that anything I use regularly I should be able to store attractively in view, to keep myself from leaving it out and ugly.
Any suggestions on attractively storing hard headbands?
emcsquared
Pinterest tells me I should take an oatmeal carton, decoupage it with pictures of kittens and unicorns, and use it as a stand to hold my hard headbands.
Instead, I leave the headbands laying in a drawer with my out-of-season socks and tights and never wear them (see note above regarding hair that defies hair accessories).
lucy stone
I have a giant margarita glass in my bedroom and I hang them off the edge.
Liana
Honeypillows, your comment on the jeweled barrettes from prom cracked me up. I still have these terrifically gaudy ones from prom floating around in one of my old jewelry boxes somewhere, where they will likely never be used again.
I’m no help on hard headband storage. I must have a funny shaped head — they give me headaches, without fail.
M in CA
I keep my hair ties (Goody rubber bands) on a carabiner in my top drawer. This is the most organized thing I’ve ever done.
M in NJ
Similar to M in CA, I use binder rings to hold together my hair elastics. http://www.officedepot.com/a/products/937624/Office-Depot-Brand-Loose-Leaf-Rings/?Channel=Google&mr:trackingCode=B91A6F1B-EC81-DE11-B7F3-0019B9C043EB&mr:referralID=NA&cm_mmc=Mercent-_-Googlepla-_-Office_Supplies+Binders_Accessories-_-937624&mr:keyword={keyword}&mr:ad=19966463156&mr:adType=pla
Jordan
Old shot glass. Bobby pins in the glass, elastics around the outside. Boom done. I really have to step it up on the hair accessories….
ss
My accessories stop at pins and elastics too, and there are never that many around because the old ones get binned when lose their stretchiness or bendiness and I get a new packet. My mind kind of boggles at having so many hair accessories that they require their own storage …
Mountain Girl
I store bobby pins, spin pins and hair pins in old prescription bottles. I have a couple of decorative glass jars on the vanity – one has hair supplies and the other has cotton balls. I haven’t found a good way to store the elastics but think I’m going to use one of the suggestions above to spruce it up a bit.