This list is chock full of surprising household items you should keep in your craft room that are helpful, useful and/or just plain awesome!
There are about a million articles out there about which craft supplies are the best and which craft supplies you should DEFINITELY have in your craft room. But you know what no one really talks about? How you can use the items you already have at home in you craft projects. Both tools and supplies. It’s a great way to save money and space and time.
So today we’re going to chat about a whole bunch or surprising household items you should have in your craft room. Some are materials, some are tools, some are just things that will make your life either cleaner or easier.
And I can promise you, I’ve used every single one of these over the years, they’re all winners!
Surprising Household Items You Should Keep in Your Craft Room
- Lint Roller – you can use this for so many things from picking up small threads, to scraps of paper to the dreaded glitter!
- Needle Nose Pliers – If you craft jewelry, you probably already have a pair of needle nose pliers in your craft room, but they’re handy for a lot more than that. I use them to hold small things but they’re also good for things like opening a small container that’s stuck!
- Bamboo BBQ skewers – Ok, hear me out, these small round wood skewers can be used in place of small dowels in crafting. They’re easier and cheaper to find. You can also use them for things like holding beads while you paint them so you don’t get your fingers dirty. Or my favorite use, as tiny dispoable paint stirrers!
- Toothpicks – the bamboo skewer’s little sibling, toothpicks are obviously hand for a million things but my favorite uses are to apply glue to small spots and to paint tiny dots. One other great use for toothpicks is that you can stick them in a piece of foam and use them to hold up something you’re painting so it can dry on all sides.
- Party Tablecloths – I actually prefer paper party tablecloths because they’re better for the environment but if I have a plastic party tablecloth, that’s good for wetter messier crafts and I can just let it dry, fold it back up and use it again to protect my tabletop.
- Newspaper – Newspaper is obviously great for protecting a surface, but don’t pass on its other uses. You can use it for paper mache or even as a material for collage.
- Paper Plates – There are about a million really really cute paper plate crafts for kids on the internet. But my favorite craft room use for paper plates is as a paint palette. The raised edge keeps the paint contained and you can toss it when you’re finished. I think a lot people do this for children, but it’s really very handy for adult crafting too.
- Baby Wipes – I no longer have a baby. But I still buy baby wipes. They’re not just good for wiping off dirty hands, you can also use them to clean up paint drips on a tabletop or to wipe off a tool when you’re finished with it. They’re great for gentle dusting. And they’re also handy for paint mistakes. Go outside the line? Just use a baby wipe to remove the wet paint from your project and try again. The other advantage that makes baby wipes better than a paper towel is their strength and that they won’t leave lint or bits of paper behind. The unscented “water” wipes without aloe or anything else added, work best for crafting.
- Nail Files/ Emory Boards – I honestly use a nail file for crafting more than I use sandpaper. For a small craft projects, it’s a lot easier to manage and use especially on edges and corners. And nail files are great for crafting because they already some with a rough and smooth side.
- Freezer Paper – Freezer paper is good for a lot of things in a craft room. I love to use it as an iron on material to make stencils. That’s super easy and fun, you can cut the stencil designs with a craft knife or a cutting machine and just press with an iron to use it as a stencil, it peels right off at the end. Freezer paper is also really great to put between layers of fabric, for example, inside a t-shirt, if you are trying to prevent paint from bleeding through. The plastic coating is waterproof. That same quality makes freezer paper a great thing to put down to protect your works surface as well.
- Plastic Knives and Spoons – I use disposable silverware all the time to stir paint. It’s so much better to mix colors with something like this instead of trying to do it with your paintbrush. Then you can just wipe the plastic utensil off with a baby wipe (see above) and use it again and again.
- Contact Paper – I get clear name brand contact paper at the dollar store. It’s usually sold as shelf liner or book covers. Contact paper works really well as transfer tape for your vinyl projects, but it’s a fraction of the cost of name brand transfer tape. You can also use clear contact paper as a projective layer for kids crafts.
- A Magnet – I know, sounds weird. But have you ever dropped a box of pins ( or tacks, or brads or paperclips) on your craft room carpet? They sell sewing specific magnet wands to pick up pins, but all you really need is a regular strong kitchen magnet and you can make sure you don’t step on errant pin that you didn’t see.
- Medical Gloves (powder free) – I mean, they keep your hands clean. That all we really need to say! Particularly important if you’re crafting with stinky glue or resin or even if you don’t want to get paint on your manicure. Keeping a box in your craft room will prevent you from hunting around in your medicine cabinet every time you start a new project.
- Safety Glasses – (They make CUTE safety glasses now!) I think we most often think of wearing safety glasses for big DIY project where you’re using “real” tools, but there are plenty of craft projects where we really should wear safety glasses too. Working with resin or anything else with toxic fumes like spray paint. Other craft projects that should require safety glasses are things like wood or linoleum carving or using sandpaper. Really, you don’t want things in your eyes!
- Hair Clip – It took me until this year to add a dedicated hair clip to my craft room. And then I kind of felt like an idiot. I used to try and keep my hair back with a pencil or a paintbrush or whatever else I could find so I didn’t have to stop my project and lose my momentum. Keep a hair clip in your craft room, don’t get hair in your craft projects (or craft supplies in your hair!)
- Vacuum – It just so happens that the best place for our cordless vacuum is mounted on the wall inside the door of my office. It’s where we had wall space and an outlet. The bonus of that has been if (ok, honestly WHEN) I make a craft mess, I can clean it up much more easily and I don’t track glitter or anything else all over my house going to get the vacuum.
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Craft and Knitwear Designer at Little Red Window Design
Welcome to Little Red Window! I’m Cassie, a professional craft and knitwear designer working in the field for more than 10 years. I have a degree in Art History from Northwestern University and a Master's Degree in Architecture and Design from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. I've designed more than 300 separate knitting patterns, hundreds of craft projects, and I love to bring joy to your crafts and knitting with well-designed, easy to understand tutorials and patterns.
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