Wednesday, June 20, 2012

9 Ways to Tidy Up Your Desk

kangaroo-shaped desk organizer

If you want to store things on your desktop in an organized manner, and you're looking to buy some cool products for that purpose, you can go one of two ways. You can get paper clip holders, pencil cups, etc. — or you can get an all-in-one desk organizer, also known as a desk tidy.

Some of the coolest desk tidies come from Vacavaliente — specifically, from its Amigos product line. I've mentioned the dog-shaped desktop organizer before, but there's also a kangaroo, a horse, a cat, and more. Some of the places you can find these are the MoMA store kangaroo, AHA life (kangaroo and horse) and Hip Urban Green (dog) in the U.S. — and Zany in New Zealand (cat, kangaroo, dog). As the MoMA site explains, they are made from "100% reconstituted leather, an environmentally friendly material composed of recycled leather."


dog-shaped desk organizer

For a different take on the animal theme, there's the Rocky Desk Butler from J-me.


3-piece desk organizer

Rhombins, sold by The Utility Collective, is a three-piece organizer that can be reconfigured to meet your needs. I'm tickled to learn that these organizers come from Petaluma, just a two-hour drive away from me — and that they're "made using Cereplast, a plant based bio-plastic." [via Herman Miller]


desk tidy made from stacking ceramic cylinders

Another product that allows for various configurations is the Shuffle Tidy from Ralli Design, with its six earthenware cylinders, each of which has a removable wood base. You can buy this desk tidy from  Made in These Isles (white version) or from Do Shop Limited (white or black). [via Modern Design Trends]


wood block desk organizer

L'Atelier d'exercices has a wood block desk organizer, also available from Luminaire. [via Better Living Through Design]


wood desktop organizer with four sections

And here's another wooden desktop organizer; this one comes from WoodMarvels.com and can also be bought through Ponoko, in two sizes (5 cm high and 8 cm high). These do require some assembly at home — but the Ponoko site assure us that "all that is needed for assembly is some carpenters glue and a few hours to allow everything to dry together."


keyboard-shaped organizer

Now that we've looked at some lovely desk tidies, let's take a look at some novelty products, starting with the Keyboard Organizer. [via Lifehacker and This is Why I'm Broke]


desk organizer shaped like a truck

Troika makes the Office Trucker and the Office Express. These are mostly intended to be promotional items, with your company's name imprinted on them. But you can find a few places selling individual pieces with no personalization — including Amazon.com, which has the Office Trucker.


desktop organizer shaped like a miniature toolbox

And finally, here's the Miniature Desktop Toolbox from Busted Knuckle Garage, made from "heavy duty .24 gauge steel" and "powder-coated in toolbox red."

Anyone have a favorite among all of these? I'm always curious as to which products hit other people's fancy.

3 comments:

JustGail said...

I think my favorites are the rhombins, shuffle, and truck. The toolbox would be better if it had a drawer for small bits like stamps, paper clips and most importantly, to keep rubber bands hidden from the kitties.

Personally, I prefer things that maximize the amount of storage and take up the least amount of room on a desk, and don't have places to put things that will be knocked off, like clips on the desk butler. The kangaroo desk tidy is cool, but for me, it takes up too much space for what it holds.

Maybe I need to re-think what has to be on my desk?

Jeri Dansky said...

Everyone works differently, JustGail. I hardly ever use paper clips or rubber bands, so they don't live on my desk. What lives on my desk — actually, on top of the low file cabinet just next to my desk - is a pencil cup (that also holds scissors), a stapler, a tape dispenser, and (sometimes) a staple puller.

Here's a photo of my desktop tools — excluding the larger things like printer, scanner, etc.

Cynthia Friedlob said...

I like the miniature desktop toolbox, but my favorite website name is "This Is Why I'm Broke!"