Forgive me if my searches have missed it, but I cannot find what I'm looking for.

I don't have a huge collection of inks, currently six bottles with the possibility of growing, but I want to find a nice way to store them/display them so that they aren't just sitting on on the back of my desk in the corner.

I'm thinking some sort of small curio or barrister cabinet, ideally small enough to sit on my desk. Perhaps a foot or so high, something like a fancy jewelry box. Glass doors would be nice, and I'd love to find one of nice wood construction and a somewhat dark finish. I could even work with a miniature chest of drawers, and just pull the drawers out to set the ink bottle in the holes.

Of course the problem I'm having is what exactly to be searching for. If I search miniature anything all I turn up are dollhouse pieces which are obviously much to small to be of any use. I would think something like this would already exist, perhaps something from the past used to keep chemical bottles/samples or dye bottles, even spice bottles in, but what something like this would be called eludes me.

Might anyone have any suggestions or leads?

Try searching for "shadow box"

There's also another thread here on FPN with pictures of a nice little cabinet from a craft store that someone painted.

There are little display-cabinets that you can buy, made of glass or plastic (I'm sure there are better ones made of wood & glass as well), which are typically used for displaying trinkets such as thimbles, little bells, toy cars and whatnot. I think such an item would be very suitable for storing & displaying ink-bottles.

What about something like this?

You might also want to try out your luck in a big DIY/handworkers/crafts market and look for a box big enough with, like 10 3-to-3 inch by 10 4-to-4 inch pockets or wells for, say, screws and nails etc and then stand it up vertically. Sorry for my want of a better vocabulary here.
I've just got a dozen of the inks I use most this week taking a nap on the left-hand side of my desk while the others are all in a shoe box up close in the bookshelf.

Mike

That's really close to what I'm looking for, depending on the size anyway. I just can't figure out what search terms to put in to a website to find them.

I would look locally (and I have for that matter) but I do live in the middle of nowhere and we have no specialist stores, we have a walmart and a kmart, and that's it as far as general shopping, so I have to look online for things out of the ordinary and finding the right search terms can be bothersome.

I thought it would be fairly easy to find a small shelf suitable for holding in bottles, but I had no luck. Originally I thought I could find a spice rack, since a lot of spice bottles are similar in size to ink . . . that went nowhere. I looked at craft stores like Michael's or JoAnn Fabrics, at home stores like Bed Bath & Beyond, at general stores like Target, Meijier, or Ikea, at places like Pier One Imports, etc. Nothing. I was really kinda surprised at how little I found.

I ended up making a simple unit with four shelves out of some 1/4" by 3" poplar boards from Lowe's. It's big enough to hold over 30 narrow ink bottles like standard Noodlers if I really squeeze them in tight (it'll hold up to eight Noodler's bottles or six Private Reserve bottles per shelf). I covered it in a dark brown decoupage to match my pen box.

Note that one of my main criteria was that the shelf be cheap. I think I spent under $10 on this, including the wood, the paper for the decoupage cover, and felt to line the shelves.

Good luck, and post details if you find something . . .

Nabster, go to Google and search for variations of the following terms:

Display cabinet.
Curio cabinet.
Trinket cabinet.

And whatever else you can think of. That's what they're called. To have a bit more luck, include the word 'tabletop', just in case. A 'display cabinet' is usually a huge thing the size of a bookcase, and you don't want that.

...do you?

I've tried all sorts of terms, including those, but nothing comes up that fits my size and finish requirements. They're either stand-alone units, made of junk, or hideously expensive. You wouldn't think it would be so hard to find a nice small wooden cabinet.

A good tip for something like this if you have some basic woodworking skills. First buy a nice picture frame, now build the box to fit behind this frame. Add hinges and a catch to the picture frame and you have a nice custom made box. The photo frame will make it look very fancy and the box can be built very basic. Most home stores like Lowes and the like have thinner wood like oak that will make for perfect shelves.

I have a bunch of matching frames in my home office and I plan to use one like this so they match. I am also thinking about making it recess into the wall so that it will look just like one of the photos on the wall.

Not it's intended purpose to be sure, but I've been thinking about something like this tea chest.

Just bite the bullet and plan for the future with one of these:


There's actually a thread on here somewhere telling where to buy these, and they were surprisingly affordable.

Edited to add link to referenced thread:
My ink storage problem solved!