Vanity Organised

I've been tidying my tip of a bedroom bit by bit this year and the more I do, the more hopeless it seems. I am a collector (if you hadn't already guessed) and have a rather obsessive nature which I've discovered is genetic (we found over 100 pairs of scissors when we cleared out my Granny's house-random I know and she still had her mind!). Basically I own too many things. The shoes alone take up the majority of my bedroom, then there's the dolls I've collected for the past 30 years, the huge amount of cosmetics I own, the large jewellery collection, the hundreds of dresses...I could go on all day. I'm a 'keeper' (prefer that term to 'hoarder'!), I'm not big on throwing stuff out especially if it's got some sort of meaning and I tend to grow attached to all my belongings! With my typical Gemini split-personality though, I do get a huge sense of satisfaction when I throw out a big bag of rubbish, I do love cleaning (not so big on 'tidying') and I don't want to live in a mess. So I figure, all is not lost! A few weeks ago, I decided I would tidy my vanity area. I keep my perfumes and daily skincare items here along with some hair things and it had become rather disorganised and messy. Unfortunately I didn't take a 'before' pic because I hadn't intended to blog about it at all until I'd rearranged it and thought it might be something you'd be interested in.

I was kinda in two minds about whether to make it pretty looking or practical. In the end I went with a mixture of the two and since these pictures, I've tweaked it a little bit, so it's even easier for me to keep and access. It's not a massive space to work with and I've always dreamed of a huge ornate dressing table-but that will remain a dream for some time I think! On the top shelf I put hair products to one side and got rid of a few things I haven't used in a while. At the moment it's all Percy & Reed stuff with the exception of a can of Batiste Dry Shampoo which is almost finished and some Virgin Vie hair sparkle.

At the opposite end there's a few body products (not the body lotions I use every day/week), things like glittery creams and Palmer's Body Gloss which I tend to only use in summer months/special occasions. In between the ends are are my fragrances. This is where I was torn with whether to de-box them all, because they look prettier like that or keep them in their boxes (it's better if they're kept out of direct light etc). I kept most in boxes, the LAMB at the back I haven't started yet (I've just finished a 50ml and this is a huge 100ml), YSL Elle and J-Lo Still are almost finished, so I chucked their boxes as a reminder to use them up. Soap & Glory I spray each night before bed, so it's easier out of it's box and is almost finished too. Other fragrances are my Vivienne Westwood Boudoir, Ghost, Lancome Miracle (not much left), Anais Anais (rarely use this, so probably should've thrown it out), an empty Moschino Cheap & Chic which I can't part with and Jean Paul Gaultier Fragile which I don't like the smell of but bought purely for the gorgeous 'snow globe' bottle.

There's also a couple of shoe themed atomisers which were given to me as gifts!

Then there's my Harajuku Lovers fragrances. I have every bottle they've produced which is a heck of a lot and my Sunshine Cuties and Wicked Style have been dotted around my room for months and I never use them. My globe houses the original scents and out of them I really only use G and L'il Angel, so I did contemplate switching the bases for ones I would use. My Super G and G Of The Sea are too pretty to keep in their boxes, so I put them out. WS Baby I really like, so she's in a box on the top shelf and the others are under the shelf (I want to keep them boxed as they have flocked hair that will gather dust)-it's not ideal but I don't have room for everything! After some rearranging, my summer mini's are piled up in their boxes at the side which will hopefully have me reaching for them more often. The only ones not shown here are my Snow Bunnies, which I've never used yet (they are the original scent).

So my big globe sits on the base with the Wicked Style under the shelf along with a few boxes of hair clips and bows and things. In front of that are the skincare items I use regularly, my eye makeup remover, eye creams, moisturisers etc I also have a little Soap & Glory dish with kirby grips in one side and bands and clasps in the other.

Here's some of what I threw out; old or empty perfume bottles, some finished or nearly finished skincare things. I struggled a bit with this part I have to admit and I buckled and took the Givenchy Organza back out of the rubbish bag! I can remember when this fragrance launched and my work gave me a full-size bottle and I thought it was the coolest thing, so it's sitting on my window-sill now. So I'm getting there slowly...!

My Vanity

I've made some progress tidying my room, although it's been put on hold this week, whilst I sort out my ebay parcels. I'm pleased to have finished my little vanity area, which was in a terrible state. I threw out loads of old things, sorted my hair clips and elastics into cute tins and displayed my fragrances better.
As you can see from the pics (the first image has some little notes), my everyday fragrances are Ghost, Lancome Miracle, Still by Jennifer Lopez, 'L' Gwen Stefani and my Harajuku Lovers (most used are L'il Angel and G). I wear YSL Elle on special occassions (it's quite overpowering) and occassionally use Lacoste Touch of Pink (nearly finished the huge bottle and fallen out of love with it lately) and Cacheral Anais Anais. I've just finished Love at First Glow (J Lo) and another bottle of Christian Dior J'adore. I used to work on a perfume counter so got loads of freebies there, the huge bottle of J'adore, Envy, Very Valentino and Organza are some I don't wear now (they're very old) but kept the bottles to display. Jean Paul Gaultier Fragile I got as a present whenever it launched. I purely wanted it for the bottle, which is like a little snow globe. The fragrance sucks and I was really annoyed when my friends starting using it as I wanted to keep it for decorative purposes and the liquid inside has gone down slightly : (
I have loads of the other JPG fragrances which I love the smell of (which aren't displayed here). I used to buy the limited edition bottles (that come in decorative tins) until I realised I was actually allergic to the scent! They are so pretty though that I like to just look at them. I also bought a beautfiul set years ago of 3 mini JPG Classique bottles which came with a silver necklace that had a huge ring which held the bottle inside, so cool!
I have some random glittery body lotions which I don't use frequently and Palmers body gloss which looks fabulous on tanned skin (I'm blue but never mind!) and Soap&Glory Glow Lotion which was my first ever S&G product and I still love it. Virgin Vie glitter hairspray, Pout tanning stuff which I haven't used for ages. The little Too Faced cosmetics bag contains some little random things I'm trying, like eye lotions, serums and lip balm, nail files etc. I also have some hair products here, my fave is the Batiste dry shampoo, I don't know how I lived before this!
My skincare products aren't too exciting due to my newly problematic skin. Just No7 toner, supermarket moisturiser, Soap&Glory Glow Job and eye gel, Lancome eye makeup remover and acne treatment gel. Under the shelf are a couple of boxes with face masks and other items. I have a ridiculous amount of hair clips, so I sorted (into the white Soap&Glory dish) the kirbi grips on one side and little clasps on the other. I have a little tin filled with elastics and bobbles and another tin with bigger, fancy clips. I sit and do my makeup in front of another mirror, so this is more a storage space rather than a dresser. As with all images on this blog, click to enlarge!