apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

CDs are not the status thing they were in the 90s. Remember those towers that ostentatiously displayed your CD collection? In fact, with the coming of the iPod, iTunes, and the plethora of iProducts, the little jewel case has become a bit "passay"....(sorry, can't figure out accents on my pc at work). We still have a CD player, and our CDs remain in a small bookcase, but I no longer pay attention to classifying them the way I used to. I buy most of my music online now. If a chair blocks said bookcase, no biggie.

Keep them hidden. That is all.

Keeping everything in boxes also helps eliminate the look of clutter. They're especially handy if you don't have the luxury of hiding everything behind doors.

The buffet looks great. I was all about displaying my CDs and DVDs back in high school, but now mine are getting packing into convenient IKEA media storage boxes that look a whole lot better than an ugly CD tower. I'm all about boxes and baskets these days since it's about the only way to make my cluttered environs seem less so.

In a small apartment, CD's and DVD's can quickly take over a room. They take up space and create chunks of patterned area which amount to advertising. If you can, hiding it all makes a room much more streamlined. I own few DVD's, mainly about 500 CD's. They used to be in a large entertainment unit, plus CD tower unit, all visible. Popping the CD jewel cases, retrieving the liner notes and back art, and placing the book/art/CD in vinyl envelopes created for the purpose reduced incredibly the amount of space they took up. They now take up the 2 tiny drawers in an Ike Malm nightstand. Easily retrieved by flipping to the appropriate CD. Can do the same with DVD's (although I'd probably find a way to store the boxes, also out of sight, if I intended to ever use them again; jewel boxes for CD's can be replaced later if I feel the need while many DVD boxes cannot). Either way, storing away from sight will give a more pleasing streamlined look, and take up less room, if you separate the CD's and DVD's from their containers.

I used to have my DVDs on shelves on either side of my TV (out of necessity), but I replaced the shelves with an old buffet from the 30s, and it looks great! Plus, I don't have to dust all those DVD cases anymore.

My husband digitized our entire cd library at full quality, lossless encoding (i.e. no bad quality mp3s!) Everything is all on one hard drive, backed up on a second one not attached to a computer, and the original cds are stacked in empty 100-count towers, hidden behind books. Pretty awesome - just glad he did it and not me! We do still have some of the "cool" cases that cds came in knocking around because we feel bad throwing them out - you know the more custom ones with good art fold outs and such. There's the real question: what to do with the packaging leftovers?

I don't like all my dvds being on display, it makes me feel cluttered. With my current set up, about half of them are and it's really annoying. Next time I get around to Ikea, I'm going to measure the Expedit drawers to see if dvds fit in them sideways (anyone know?). If so I'm going to buy them & those rubber dvd things at Ikea and use drawers for my collection. Much neater and easier to look at movies than craning my neck to the side.

I agree!!! Keep them hidden.

Home body, I kept the green-friendly paper packaged CD's in tact. In general, they take up half the room of a jewel box. So while I have the vast majority of my CD's in vinyl envelopes, the paper-packaged CD's are stored out of sight with the enveloped ones. I've also stored away (meaning, not something I'll unpack any time soon) cardboard coverings for jewel cases and the boxes from box sets. I don't need to see them. I still own them. I have them if I ever want to make the transition back from envelopes to jewel boxes.

I shipped off all my CDs (about 600, all classical) and had them digitized. Forget how much neater it *looks*, it's about a thousand times more user-friendly. Now I can actually find things when I want them!

I don't have many movies but you can do something similar with them -- rip the DVDs to a portable hard drive and play them through a console (I use my PS3). Way easier.

I like them hidden, mostly because it means less dusting.

I guess I'm in the minority...I like the "before" pictures better. For one thing, I love cube-y shelves like that (in fact I'd love to find one just like this) and I like the games, baskets, etc being visible - makes it feel more homey to me.

Hidden is better.
Keeps kids (if you have any) and their little hands out of the open entertainment center

Organizing Tip: Doors and Drawers are your Friends.

I love leaving my books out I think they look decorative and pretty. But it doesn't seem to matter how I organize my DVD's (mixed them in with the books, organized by color) they always look like clutter. Putting them behind a door is the only real option for my sanity.

hidden is good if you can but if you can't do that, color coordinating makes it look better. more organized.

ditto to bepsf's comment! I think that should be a bumper sticker or a tee shirt....

Mine are stored in my Expedits, but behind doors. I have 100s of both DVDs and CDs, and the DVDs are reference for what I do. I don't mind seeing them, but the doors keep them a little cleaner.

The buffet looks okay, but I'd rather see the surface clean and the TV wall mounted or as a pull down screen.

Just about every open shelf unit would look better with editing or covering the open area with doors or fabric.

I ripped all 500 of mine to lossless FLAC format, and the discs are now stored in binders under my bed as backups, just in case. The vanilla jewel boxes got recycled. I'm keeping the custom packages in separate boxes, and what few CDs I had in extra-special packaging live on in their cool digs behind closed doors.

The booklets have been stashed in CD storage drawers out in the living room for easy access while listening. The back cover inserts live in separate boxes along side the CDs themselves.

The next project will involve ripping the 100 or so DVDs I own and recycling their excess packaging as well.

sunspot42: I'm curious to know where and how you found a recycler that will take jewel and DVD cases. The curbside pickup here only takes bottles with necks, nothing else plastic. Are there special recycling centers you can bring other sorts of plastic to?

>I'm curious to know where and how you found
>a recycler that will take jewel and DVD cases

Where I lived, they took all plastics. Can't remember which plastic jewel cases are made out of, but IIRC it's a fairly common one and easily recycled.

Oh, and since that original post I removed about half of my DVD's from their jewel cases, put them in a binder and recycled their original packaging. This made my latest move - from a 1 bedroom to a studio - a lot easier. My entire media collection fit in a couple of boxes, as opposed to six or seven, and today I got rid of a pair of storage towers where the CDs and DVDs used to live.