As I mentioned a few days back I store the bulk of my cards in a 48 drawer library card catalog cabinet like the one pictured to the right (Image liberally borrowed from a crafter who also sees the appeal of these units!). Just search google images for library card catalog. These units not only provide functional storage for cards, thread, ribbons, buttons, nails, screws etc. they also act as a nice piece of furniture. Many of the units are made of solid hardwood - oak in my case, and would look right at home in a home den or library.
But what about your binders which store the 9 pocket pages ? Currently mine is a hodge podge of mismatched binders, some decent looking ones from Ultra Pro, others just basic D-ring units from Office Depot. At some point I would like to buy a large quantity of nice matching albums and take the time to type up nice identifiers for the spines. MJ Roop - now out of business had beautiful (but very expensive) albums which came custom ordered for each particular set. Something like the binders pictured on the top right with protective sleeves.
Unfortunately when it comes to spending the limited hobby budget I always find something I want more than nice binders. What about decent looking boxes to store completed sets which don't make it to the binders? You know that 89-90 O-Pee-Chee set that you want to keep but don't feel like filling a $10 dollar binder with $10 dollars in 9 pocket pages. Like most people I have a ton of the plain white cardboard boxes of various lengths - half of which are marked up with the scars of past contents. Feel free to share your ideas - who knows maybe if you can make the stuff look somewhat appealing the wife or better half will allow you to take it out of those big rubbermaid containers. Till next time.
Ah, the age old question of how to store and display the collection. I use Archival Methods' 3" D-ring binders (shown above) for pre-1990 cards. They may seem expensive, but relative to the cost of the several vintage sets kept inside, they're worth every dime. At one time, I was putting all my vintage cards into top loaders but the top loaders tend to get scuffed and scratched when frequently handled. I now put all cards (except high-end RCs) into a soft-sleeve and then into Ultra-Pro pages.
ReplyDelete