Cork Board Button Keeper

We have a thing for buttons, but we've never been very good at organizing or actually wearing most of them. Normally, we'll stick one or two on a favorite bag or jacket and then tuck the rest of our pins away in a drawer, out of sight -- and therefore -- out of mind. Wanting to keep track of all the buttons we own, we came up with this easy and decorative way to consolidate all them so that we can give them all a chance to shine, whether we end up wearing them or not.

We bought this small framed bulletin board at the Goodwill for a couple of bucks. We didn't like the light wood color of the frame, so we sanded it down and painted it white.

Then we attached all of our buttons on the board, and voila!, a very cheap and simple solution to our dilemma. Hang the board in your bedroom or bathroom as a handy reminder to wear your buttons. Or, for those of you who don't care to keep the bulletin board in public view, hang it on a wall inside of your closet.

Comments (14)

cute idea! too bad i just garage-saled most of mine on saturday.

posted by squiggle on October 20th 2008 at 7:58am
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Le Tigre. Nice.

posted by cocoboo on October 20th 2008 at 7:59am
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Friends and I all did this when we were 6 years old (26 years ago), and I learned it from my parents. It is indeed a nice way to keep them all in one place and a fun display.

posted by fraise on October 20th 2008 at 8:33am
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Great idea! I'll be linking to this in the Daily DIY.

posted by Rachel@oneprettything.com on October 20th 2008 at 8:53am
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nice idea. when i was in high school i had a canvas messenger bag-style purse that I would put my buttons and after I stopped using it I miss seeing those buttons all the time. Seems like a nice idea. :)

and funny to see the boob buttons but I really like the yoshimoto nara button ^_^

posted by witchbaby on October 20th 2008 at 9:29am
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I used to keep mine in those clear boxes you get sets of polyhedral dice in (any nerds know what I'm talking about?) But I recently transferred my collection to this here vase.

http://www.ikea.com/ca/en/catalog/products/30113623

The pins only cover the bottom an inch high, but heck, they still look cool. I kind of want to keep them in a clear glass granny-style candy dish of some sort.

posted by natomaton on October 20th 2008 at 10:07am
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I keep all of my buttons stuck in the headliner of my car. It amuses people who've never ridden in my car before, I can pick a new one each day before I go to work, and I can stick pictures and movie ticket stubs and all kinds of nifty stuff up there like a bulletin board. My kid especially likes that I hang pictures of her above her seat. Here's one picture, but there's a couple in a row from different angles.

http://flickr.com/photos/rhiannononon/2960194376/

posted by rhiannoncharisse on October 20th 2008 at 3:42pm
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I've had my buttons displayed on a large cork board for years. Before my button collection got really big, I had them all pinned to a vintage apron hung on the wall.

posted by Stiletto on October 20th 2008 at 4:36pm
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Nice idea but I think it would look even nicer if you put a piece of fabric or felt against the cork as a backdrop.

:o)

posted by Kouklah on October 20th 2008 at 4:55pm
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I've always used scrap pieces of vintage fabric and just tacked those up with pushpins. Another thing i used to do is hang a ribbon from something and put them along the ribbon. Same principle, but i'm sure almost everyone has some scrap fabric and thumbtacks laying around!

posted by Miss Upsetter on October 20th 2008 at 5:57pm
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I decluttered all my buttons to the Goodwill. Hopefully from there they were disbursed to Toronto leftists.

posted by peacelily on October 20th 2008 at 5:58pm
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I like what I did with my buttons: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ursonate/2816628448/

posted by charlenemcbride on October 20th 2008 at 6:59pm
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I tacked mine to a pillow.

posted by asked you first on October 20th 2008 at 10:54pm
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A cork bulletin board is a good way to organize a variety of keepsakes or even knick-knacks in a manner which looks very cohesive and organized. This is called "scrap boarding", but you don't have to do it as a theme or anything. It's just a way to put a frame around all of the little bits and pieces you might display on or near your desk.

I have one next to my desk with a calendar, framed picture of my husband, a Japanese New Year's wish plaque and a couple of ornamental figures. The figures can be held in place with a (doubled over) rubber band (ran across the object and anchored on each side by a push pin) or special scrap boarding pins. It's a lot nicer than scattering things all over the place.

posted by Orchid64 on October 21st 2008 at 2:41am
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