I have not posted in a while since I was moving to another city, sorry for the long time I was silent. Having moved to another place brought the opportunity to realise a solution I was longing for a long time now – a dedicated piece of furniture to store my photo gear. I browsed the web for solutions and found many. Some people keep their stuff in bags, some in shelfes, some on drawers.
Today I want to present what solution for storing my photo gear I chose. Proudly I want to mention that it was a gift from my wife – I was yacking so long for a photo gear shelf that she gave me a gift voucher so that I could finally go and buy my photo shelf. The solution I chose turned out to be an Ikea Billy bookshelf (202x80x28 cm) with two glass doors in an aluminum frame (Morebo).
I had two requirements which the storage solution should fulfill. Firstly, the lenses and cameras should be presented nicely (=glass doors). Secondly, the accessories and “small stuff” should be hidden from view. I looked at many cabinets with glass doors in the upper half and drawers or non-transparent doors in the bottom half. But somehow this never appealed to me, just did not look right.
Finally I decided to take full glass doors and sort the smaller stuff into boxes. Ikea offers a good solution for this. I bought a Billy bookshelf with two extra shelf boards and Morebo glass doors. The shelf itself is quite cheap (59 Euros), but the doors are costly (50 Euros each). Kind of weird to pay more for the doors than for the shelf itself…
Be sure to bolt the shelf to the wall ! The doors are comparatively heavy and when the self is empty with the doors open the complete piece of furniture will tip over ! I learned that the hard way, but was able to prevent a catastrophe.
Here is the shopping list for this solution (completely Ikea):
– 1x Billy bookshelf (202x80x28 cm) in birch veneer (59 Euros)
– 2x Billy Morebo doors (50 Euros each; yes, the doors cost more than the shelf)
– 2x Extra shelf boards (12 Euro each)
– 5x 2 Kassett black cardboard boxes (21x26x15 cm, 4,99 Euros for 2 boxes)
TOTAL 208 Euros
The shelf now holds all photo gear (excluding the large stuff like tripod, light stands, backdrop frame, backdrop cloth). I like it very much because you have everything sorted for quick access. The boxes I use more frequently are on a higher shelf board for easier handling (cables, chargers, batteries, memory cards). The stuff I do not need to access so often is at the bottom (manuals, negatives, film material, GPS unit etc.).
This is one of many possible ways to store your photo gear. I would love to learn about your gear storage solution. Feel free to drop me a line or you can create a guest post presenting your way of storing your stuff.
