Easy DIY Thread Storage Cart


Here is an easy do-it-yourself solution for thread storage.
I just came into a lot of embroidery thread! Anita Goodesign had an online "Yard Sale".  They were clearing out inventory from their recent events and projects.  One of the items for sale was a limited quantity of a Box of Thread.  For $30, it said you get a box of embroidery thread that has been used for various recent events.  The picture showed that the spools all looked like they had a good amount of thread on them, so I figured it was a good deal to try.

Here is what my box looked like when it arrived:
My mystery box of thread.

Here is what it looked like once I sorted them all out on my kitchen table:
Sorted and organized.

There was 160 spools in that box.  They all had a good amount of thread on them.  A few were still unused in their new wrappings.  All good quality - Floriani, Mettler and Madeira.    For $30 plus $9 shipping, each spool was only $0.24.  I'd say that was a great deal!    Now the problem became how to store all this in an organized fashion?

I tried to store them in racks in the closet, but my closet is not that big and didn't have room for more thread - along with my current sewing threads.
My closet didn't have room.

So I searched online for some ideas.  I know there are nice thread storage cabinets available, but I wasn't looking to spend a lot of money on storage.  I decided to try and make my own.  I liked the Iris brand 10-drawer storage cart that Target has online.  But, it wouldn't arrive for another week, and I wanted something quick.   JoAnn has the 6-drawer storage cart by Iris, currently half price at $23.99 and in stock, so I could get two of them now and have 12-drawers for the price of one 10-drawer cart.  And JoAnn had another 20% off total purchase coupon, so I got both for about $38.  That was a great deal.  I picked up four bags of 2-3/4" golf tees at Target ($4 for 100 at Target), and with my glue gun I was ready to go!

MATERIALS

IRIS 6-drawer cart
2-3/4" golf tees

- one or two IRIS 6-drawer storage carts, or one IRIS 10-drawer storage cart.
- 2-3/4" golf tees - Each drawer holds 30 spools, so get enough tees for all your drawers.
- Glue gun and a few glue sticks.
- Mat with inch markings.
- Sharpie

DIRECTIONS

  1. Lay a drawer on top of your mat.  The drawer has a couple of bumps along the center on bottom.  I lined up the lower bump over a grid intersection on my mat.
  2. With a sharpie, mark a simple dot every 2" out and away from this starting dot. For the dots along the left-most and right-most edges, I marked just slightly under 2" away for a better fit.



  3. With your glue gun, add a good drop of hot glue to the top of a golf tee and glue it on a marked dot.

    Gluing in progress...



  4. When you are done, your drawer will be ready for 30 spools of thread!



The drawers can hold thread cones up to 3" in height.  I pulled all the embroidery thread out of my closet - and sorted them into the cart along with my new bundle of threads.  All of the spools fit in the drawer:  Floriani, Mettler, Brother, Simplicity, Marathon, Isacord - except for the few Sulky 1500M cones and the Madeira tall cones which are more than 3" tall.  I put those on the thread spindle which holds my Brother standard embroidery colors.

At first, I had the two carts under my sewing table, but I decided that I wanted leg room so I removed the wheels and stacked the carts along the wall.  Each drawer is labeled by colors.

Embroidery drawers all sorted and able to hold up to 360 spools!


This corner of my room is now for storing fabrics, embroidery threads and notions.

The Storage Corner. 😃

Happy Stitching!




13 comments

  1. Thanks for the tutorial. It's a great idea!

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  2. What a great idea! I have several of the Isacord boxes, but unsure of how to store so many spools.

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  3. An awesome idea! I don't have as much thread as you, but I'm off to check my little 3 drawer system to see if they will fit in there! Thank you for sharing!

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  4. great post thanks for sharing... good info

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  5. I bought all the supplies to make this great cart, but how do you get the drawers out of the base? I feel as though I will break them if I force them. Thank you.

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  6. You got a lot of thread for $39!! You did really good on the thread container. I need to check that out but right now, I have to clean out my sewing room first! I have NO ROOM for anything in there! I will have to keep this in mind for when I get my sewing room completed!! GREAT JOB!!

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  7. Is this the 12x12 drawer set? Holding that many spools looks like it could only be the bigger drawers? Thank you.

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  8. Great idea! I have been looking for storing my thread supply!

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  9. What a great idea. Golf Tees! Did you know that on most of the plastic drawer units you can take the top of the frame off and attach it to the bottom of another drawer unit? Take a close look and see if the joint is separable. If it is, then voila! One cohesive unit.
    Cheers!
    Leslie
    From Ontatio Canada

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  10. fantastic idea the golf tees for cottons in drawers many thanks

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  11. I just got my 6-drawer cart, but discovered that I can't pull the drawers out all the way. Did you have this trouble? If so, how did you fix the drawer so you could pull it out? I really like this idea! Thanks for sharing!!

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