Thursday 7 August 2014

Paintbrush and dipper bottle racks assembled

For some time I was thinking about how to organise my present workplace. Especially with the presentation of the paints I wasn't lucky at all but the racks and stands I discovered so far were either not to my taste or simply too expensive. Building my own didn't come into question since I judged me too clumsy and the task too time consuming. Finally a few weeks ago I stumpled onto Loki's longship and read his interesting posts about how he re-organised his workbench. From the moment I saw them I was fascinated by of the racks and dropped Diane from Warbases an email whether they could and would offer them for sale as well.
She was as kind and helpful as ever and for shipping reasons recommended a smaller layout than Andrew has. However 45 bottles seemed fine to me and I ordered three of the racks promptly. Just a week later I they arrived and I'm satisfied beyond words. Indeed Diane and Martin are excellent craftsmen as well as incredibly nice and helpful people.

Anyway the rack comes in six parts. Four sides and two sheets with holes to hold the dipper bottles. In case that you order more than one of them make sure not to mix up the sheets. The holes for the bottles themselves are slightly larger than those for the caps. Well-conceived but a but difficult if the builder is too eager. Nevertheless all the parts fitted perfectly and I didn't need more than a drop of PVA glue to assemble them:
The paint bottle rack.. Assembly time about 10 minutes.
Additionally I needed a new solution to store my brushes. For the last months I had them lying in an old plastic pot but I wanted to have them tidier, better sorted, nicer presented... Something like that. So I explained Diane my idea of a rack to store the brushes horizontically and sent her a picture of a comparable rack. My idea was the kind of racks that are used for Japanese swords. As usual no problem for Diane and Martin. They took the rack into production and for £3.00 one of the first ones was mine. I was pretty curious how it would look because I didn't have a picture of the finished prototype so far but what reached me on tuesday was exactly what I though of:
Paintbrush Rack for six or more brushes... Assembly time about 2 minutes.
So finally after two evenings I had my workbench sorted and the colours nicely presented. Last step will be to label the bottoms of the bottles to have an instant view on the numbers of the colours. I think for my purposes that works better than labelling the racks because I want to keep the chance to re-organise the bottles if necessary without having to re-label all the racks.
My workplace in inactive state and ready for action.
Well that's it. Let me finish this post with many thanks to Andrew for the inpiration his blog gave and especially to Diane and Martin for their kind assistance and the excellent items they produce. I'm looking forward to meeting them on Crisis this November hopefully !

23 comments:

  1. I saw those on Andrews page as well and they looked like a good idea. You're painting table looks nice and tidy. How long can that last?

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    1. Since I have to keep it tidy enough to be able to close it during the day so the potential for disorder is rather limited.
      ;-)

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  2. Now they look the business and always great to see your lovely work table.

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  3. The paint racks are certainly the ticket!

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  4. I was just eyeing the same products on the Warbases site myself. I think I will not be able to achieve such a clean desk though :)

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    1. Well. An eagle-eyed wife who is guarding the tidiness of the living room helps.
      ;-)

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  5. Nice touch with the paint brush rack, Stefan.
    I also have a similar paint desk to you but I took out the inside and made a storage rack for my paints but that was before the new paint racks that you have came out. I am very tempted.

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    1. When I bought the desk then I thought about exactly the same. But in the end I neither knew what to do with the inside then nor did I want to throw it away. Finally I decided to use it for storing some tools as well as paper, pens and such writing desk things.

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  6. I was going to order some paint racks the weekend just gone but stopped myself. But seeing these and of course Loki's original design I think I really need to get things in order. They certainly tidy the space which will please my wife! Clever idea with the paintbrush rack. I agree totally Warbases always give great service.

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    1. When it pleases yourself as well as your wife then it's definetely a must-buy for you!
      ;-)

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    2. After reading your post I went and ordered three of the paint racks!

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  7. Excellent, I need some of these myself. Thanks for the review Stefan!

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  8. Looks good mate. I aspire to something even resembling that kind of tidiness and organisation!

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    1. Thanks, Michael.
      A workplace in the living room shared with an eagle-eyed wife and two curious daughters helps to stow away things regularly. ;-)

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  9. Excellent - I wish I was that disciplined and organised!

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    1. As a civil servant and former army officer I might be shaped...
      ;-)

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  10. The brush holder is excellent. Much better than standing on ends upright.
    cheers

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    1. Without any doubt excellent work by Warbases. Putting the parts together went nearly by itself.
      ;-)

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  11. The racks do really works well, I may have to part with some cash myself!

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  12. Hi I was wondering what size bottles these hold? I'm considering using them for a different type of bottle which are 2.6cm in diameter. Would it fit?

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