In my 11 years of LEGO building I had a very weakly established sorting system. If I remember right, before my big expansion of '01 (where I got a hold of many 90s sets) my mother began sorting certain types but not colors of elements (understand that I was 5 back then). With the big expansion, I was fairly unable to sort the big collection. I'm sure there are pieces I haven't discovered that are in a big blue Rubbermaid bucket.This expansion was of about 15,000 pieces, mostly train, town and even western. But then in 2005, I made an effort to sort some newly acquired parts, especially some in the strata buckets 4496, 4107, 7837, 4679 (my favorite), among others. That went fairly well when it took off, but I just wound up losing the effort as another huge expansion, about 10,000 more parts came in the picture in 2007. Some Sterilite buckets were bought to make it a bit easier and I had a bit of loose organization. This consisted of two PAB containers, the somewhat-maintained color organized bins, and the old parts. In 2009 I just lost it again... gift LEGO, demolished MOCs, and demolished sets weren't organized anymore. But this was what tolled my interest in building as it would be too time consuming. So I made a new move, and this will cover my entire collection. I bought four sets of 3 Sterilite drawers, a much smaller size than the 2008 haul, and since then I have been working day and night to sort elements.
There are indeed a few interesting differences in my organization. My hierarchy in the 2006 sorting was as follows:
Red, Pink, Dark Red, Purple
Black
Orange
DkOrange, Brown
Blue, MdBlue, Sand Blue, Dark Blue, you name it blue
Green, lime, dark green, sand green, BtGreen, you name it green
Yellow, Gold, Tan, LtYellow
Grays, DkGrays
White
This year, Tan, which used to share the 4105 bucket with yellow, has its own bucket, I mean buckets. Two small drawers, enough to fit about 2000 small pieces, are almost at capacity, bearing tan plates. Lastly, there is a big drawer, about 1'x1'x1.5", holding all the tan brick, and it is almost full. Tan has been one of the growing colors in my collection since 2006, noted by PAB Tubs and even two cups of ALL TAN elements bought this November.
DkTan also entered the picture. It was loosely sorted to its own PAB cup, but I gave up on that. DkTan can have the capacity of two mini-drawers in my collection, but since many tiles are in use as it is, it will all squeeze into one. DkTan's big boom was the 2007 PAB Tubs with 1,071 tiles of its kind picked. After a few things, plate by plate has been added. I hope to also acquire the Fire Brigade and get a hold of the brick, and do so through LUGBULK too.
Many other changes, like Dk Blue having its own drawer, reflect out of the organization but also the recent additions. In 2006, I only had 8 dark blue elements. Now, at least 1,100 are in my collection.
But what about the minifig accessories? Those will probably be grouped in smaller buckets but yes, I do want to cater to "The People" as well... I think it'll be a matter of levers in one section, steering wheels in another, like from the first sorting.
These big changes are why sorting has to happen, as well as keeping up with it. When people are swamped with 100,000 elements in their collection, it will be hard to be motivated to build especially with this excess. Organization is efficient for time and mental health too, because stress goes away, and everything is right there. More models can be done in fewer time, and the same goes for kitbashing. Also, in my big project to improve my room, I plan on having a table filled with these buckets, so it makes my "LEGO Workspace" much neater.
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