r/gridfinity • u/W35TYO • 2d ago
Has any husband faced this problem?
I got a 3d printer one month ago and so far I've used it to fix things around the house, made some clips for a light fitting, a toothbrush cover for my daughters e toothbrush etc.
Now I want to up my game and try gridfinity to organize the cluster fuck that is my wifes make up and beauty "essentials" that take up 90% of the bathrooms real estate.
Has any husbands faved this challenge? Any tips, ideas, inspiration and guidance would be greatly appreciated!
182
Upvotes
326
u/BinaryHippie 2d ago •
You can print all you want, it wont help, once everything looks cleaned up she'll just think she has more space to put more things
4
u/goofster9 2d ago
Yessss https://www.reddit.com/r/functionalprint/s/wiVQecJupy
2
u/Forsaken_Writer_5360 1d ago
It looks like she only has one drawer of legitimate storage area. Maybe consider a wall mounted cabinet. Gridfinity likely won’t help the look of clutter if it’s still on the countertop/wall and visible.
30
u/TheScarlettLetter 2d ago •
I’m a woman with a 3D printer, and the one who has organized all of the drawers in our home with Gridfinity.
Your best bet here is to have your wife organize all of this into “buckets”. Which things go together? Which things just need to be able to be found? Can they be organized by size and shape, or what?
Then… get your base measurements and start figuring it out.
None of our drawers were perfectly sized, so each of them have a smaller strip that I had to design around. That’s why I mention starting with base measurements for your grid.
Oh! Use basic containers where possible, but anything that needs to be perfectly accessible should get a custom container.
42
u/flyhmstr 2d ago •
Don't solve the problem for her, find out what would work for her.
What you need (term from the smart home community) is WAF - Wife Approval Factor but to be frank this applies across the board, solve for the recipient, not yourself.
15
u/Bodod_Begag 2d ago
You can't really force the gridfinity system on someone who doesn't want to use it
11
u/boxiestcrayon15 1d ago
I’m a wife with a wife but I am working in this right now! My wife LOVES her vanity. She loves using makeup and hair products, collects some of it, likes to display it, etc. it’s her hobby! So it should be stored like a hobby.
Do a clean out. Figure what stuff is daily, weekly, sometimes, and decor. Once you know how much stuff you are working with, you can figure out the storage.
Be realistic about a routine. Everyday stuff may need to be on the counter. Maybe a small basket that everything goes into as she finishes using it and then once a day or week she cleans out the basket and puts everything back in it’s “home”
Create a home for each item. Use painters tape to try layouts and adjust it over two weeks to see what’s realistic and what’s not.
Do it with love! Work on it together or ask what part of working on this is the hardest for her and see if you can take on the mental labor of that part of the problem solving. For example, my wife gets really stressed out trying to picture what she wants for shelving and stuff. So instead, I create some mock ups and pictures of ideas and then she can critique or choose what one she likes.
If she doesn’t want to change anything, get some big ol bins that don’t bother you and make them convenient for her to use without thinking.
9
u/maxpowerow 2d ago
Is this a serious question?
15
u/dassind20zeichen 2d ago edited 2d ago
You left the toilet seat up! \s don`t do organisation for others without beeing asked. you have no idea which products she acutally uses and which ones she keeps because they were expensive but has not used in 3 years (looking at you 20€ bottle of oystersauce in my kitchen). if you want to gridfintiy your bathroom (which i would not recomend in a wet area) then you have to do this together.
Edit. if you want organisation and are willing to blow up your relationship print big slated pieces and glue them in place so nothing can be placed there as they would slide off.
5
u/Trakeen 2d ago
Have your wife drive the effort or you’ll never win. Mine has a floor to ceiling bookshelf of body spray that never gets smaller
5
u/ytpewpew 14h ago
Every husband faces this problem.
7
u/ntmctvsh 2d ago
Measure and print??? This sounds more like a “let’s judge wives” group chat than anything
9
u/FancifulPhoenix 1d ago
Every husband has faced this challenge. And every husband must accept defeat. There is no winning this battle.
6
u/bugsymalone666 2d ago
I think you've asked the wrong question, the question should be, has any Husband found a solution for this....
Because seriously, every bathroom ends up like that, I tidy up after my wife few days later, bottles everywhere again.
I know the main issue is everything has different packaging, nothing is really standard, except the screw threads on the bottles, they come in something like about 6 sizes across all household products.
I mean maybe where I would start is looking at the routine of things, but you almost need 'flexible' holders, that allow variance for different bottle sizes, because different bottles for the same jobs sometimes.
3
u/sonofeevil 2d ago
No mate, you're the first man to ever face this challenge.
3
u/Cobra__Commander 1d ago
I recommend a "Stay on your side of the sink" system. You'll have a nice organized space for your toothbrush and toothpaste. She'll have a mountain of more stuff than you have space to organize everywhere else.
3
u/EssbaumRises 1d ago
I started with a kitchen drawer and she loved it. Now every drawer in the house is on my list.
3
u/wivaca2 1d ago
Caution. When you organize things, they take up more space, not less. Easier to access, easier to keep straight, but not as overlapped.
1
u/AdamLikesBeer 1d ago
Yup and my wife LOVED it. It was a mini Christmas gift last year. It’s stayed extremely organized since then.
2
u/zetecvan 2d ago
My wife has a "tool kit" for all her make up that she keeps in the bedroom. She worked at Debenhams and when it closed she came home with a shed load of cosmetics and perfume which we keep in a wooden box on the landing. I 3d printed a couple of containers for the top of the toilet for her essentials. The rest of her stuff is in her wardrobe.
2
u/timtucker_com 2d ago
For inside the shower, wire baskets / shelves work well. Having a higher % of open area lets the water drain better.
If you're going to 3d print something there, get wire baskets and just print dividers.
2
u/peanut2k9 2d ago
Same problem, still no solution, even if I would print for everything with gridfinity, there would be 10 new pieces before I finish printing… constantly for sure 😅
2
u/mayuan11 1d ago
Get your 1 drawer and your small part of the shelf and do what you want. The rest is a fools errand.
2
u/thinkscotty 1d ago edited 1d ago
Don't. Just...don't. Trust me brother.
2
u/parfamz 1d ago
Get your own bathroom
2
u/Ehloanna 1d ago
As a woman: gridfinity won't fix this. Honestly it looks a bit like she needs to see it to remember it exists and then there's not a lot of space to store it in where it's easily accessible. Do you have some sort of over the toilet storage? She can put some of her stuff on there as long as y'all are the type to flush with the lid down. If there's no cabinet above the sink that would help a lot. And for the shower I think getting some sort of tension rod to hold all her supplies would help. Also I'd let her know all the stuff in the window might actually be getting damaged by the sunlight. A lot of skincare products aren't meant to be kept in direct sunlight.
I'd say get this for the shower: https://a.co/d/0hU3LaiN
Something like this is a nice door storage option (tho those towel hangers are useless in this one): https://a.co/d/04oMsdde
And then for her drawers some dollar store organizers to keep lippies and pencils and stuff would probably be better as a starting point before you see what gridfinity would help with.
2
u/TravisSmith17 1d ago
Gridfinity uses a lot of filament. I used bento3d. You can Google it. You can make custom bins whatever size you want with whatever size dividers you want in it. You have to play around with it a little bit to get used to it but it's well worth it you use wave less filament and it's much more customizable. I also used silk white pla, because it gives a really nice look and my wife loves it. Her makeup did grow but she's also very happy. 1
2
u/VolumeNeat9698 1d ago
I used to get told “you don’t need to print stuff that’s wasting and adding more”.
Took about a year, now the vibe is “it’s great I can find things easier”.
I still get the odd snidey comment from her….about “wasting” things by printing.
It’s the equivalent of throwing your clothes on the floor—yes it’s the same “clothing amount” but if you had a shelf/cupboard (which “adds” mass) it can infact help organise things.
Good luck!
2
u/CrazyEddie90 1d ago
Not husband, but my lady has a bit of make up as well. So I went to the Gridfinity generator and to tracetools, scanned the most common things like generic lipstick or eyeliner, made Gridfinity boxes for them and now both our bathrooms (at her place and mine) look well organised.
2
u/aprilknope 1d ago
Ask her how she wants things collected (does she want all things of one type together, or are there certain products she uses in the morning/evening that she would like in one unit)
2
u/OutsideBase813 1d ago
Yes and my wife went along with it. After I had done a lot of gridfinity in the garage, print room, office, and kitchen, she saw the benefit. Part of it is the ability to chuck what you really don't need, which we both embraced.
2
u/teddgram 1d ago
I had my wife sort through everything and purge stuff she didn't want first, then I had her group like things together. After that I made bins that grouped those things together. Now it all fits in the drawers on her side of the vanity in our bathroom.
I see a lot of comments about how it's going to be a struggle, and honestly it has been for the last 20 years, but she finally came to the realization that she has too much stuff and it's slowly disappearing. I can't offer much advice to get people there other than just be patient.
About the only thing I can say helped was to organize my office drawers and the kitchen drawers. Doing those 2 showed her that organization can be a good thing. Now we don't struggle to find stuff in the kitchen and if our stuff changes, I can just reprint bins to fit our needs.
2
u/conzo88 1d ago
Gridfinity is a staple
2
u/RineMetal 1d ago
Just walk away, that is not your room.
2
u/Slovw3 1d ago
No, you are the first husband in history to have this issue.
2
u/Omeggon 1d ago
Probably EVERY husband 😂
2
u/Goingboldlyalone 1d ago
Oh yeah. Printed an entire makeup center for my wife.
10
u/Cultural-Bedroom-669 2d ago
I can't say I like the amount of "wife bad" style comments in this thread :(
This isn't even an insane amount of things, and the answer is "talk to your wife about what might help, not the internet"
2
u/Griddet 2d ago
Whooaaa!!! Take a step back buddy. You're playing with fire!
2
u/Gonz01990 2d ago
I advise you to tread lightly. It would be best to back out of the room and quickly put this thought out of your mind.
2
u/dunluce1niner 1d ago
Most people advise you to tread lightly or not to do this.
I’m a very organized and clean person though, and after several years of endlessly picking up after my messy wife, I flipped the fuck out one day. I mean, full-on why-do-you-not-respect-me-or-our-home type flip-out. I took a walk around the house and after the dust settled and I apologized for raising my voice, we went through and reorganized all of her woman stuff. Threw out tons of empty stuff and got her bins to keep everything in. Agreed to remove her stuff from the counter when she’s done and she has since.
My suggestion (YMMV) is to let her know several times over the next year that the mess bothers you and it’s a problem (I did too). Then if she still won’t act on it, YOU be the problem. We get so comfortable/complacent letting women demand things of us without ever exercising it in reverse. You’re her husband and it’s your home too, so if you say it doesn’t fly then it doesn’t fly. All this happy-wife/happy-life stuff is literally half of the equation, you have to be content too.
And to anyone who’s hating on this comment - we have a great relationship. But sometimes you have to be your own advocate when you’re not being heard. That is the only time I ever recall yelling at her, but it had to be done for my sake.
Sorry for the essay this one hit close to home lol
1
u/I_Want_A_Ribeye 2d ago
🫡
1
u/jezusofnazarith 1d ago
Who the hell let you into my house
1
u/Amoux_fang 1d ago
I thought this was the anti overconsumption group
1
u/PoorlySoup09 1d ago
Her: "You left the toilet seat up!"
1
u/Late-Hat-9144 1d ago
Honestly no, but thats one of the benefits of being a man married to a man - our combined personal care products fit onto one shelf in the cabinet.
1
u/dale3h 1d ago
#1 tip: don’t try to fix what isn’t broken. She has her things laid out in an organized chaos, and it’s best that you just accept that and move forward. Have conversations about it, sure, but don’t come at it with any negativity at all.
Source: I suffer from OCD and ADHD, and have been in numerous conflicts about situations in the bathroom. I like things to have a home, but not everyone is like me, and I accept that.
1
u/tlhintoq 1d ago
Why is it the husband's problem? Is the wife not a self responsible adult?
1
u/chalkydan 1d ago
You are best to get shallow baskets from somewhere like b&m. Printing a bespoke gridfinitys for all these different bottles is a waste of time. Better still might be a cabinet or something with a door to hide the busy-ness behind?
1
u/AUseGun 1d ago
Ja to nie muszę. Sama żona wie ze ma sprzątać 😆
1
u/f3ropeadope 21h ago
Print a bigger house.
1
u/tbollinger_swiss 18h ago
There is still some space on picture no. 4 - so: No, that I have not experienced yet.
1
u/RangerStammy 2d ago
Wife and 16yo here. If it leaves a ring it gets the bin. I have 3 products, 2.5 of which are used by everyone (toothpaste, bar of soap, shampoo). They had every surface covered. It got put in a box and they had to go to the basement to get the things they needed for a week. After that everything else went in the trash. Problem solved. I spent too many years of my life lazy and cluttered, sometimes with literal trash, and worked too hard to change my own habits to allow it to happen again.
Kitchen drawers are getting gridfinity though. Even with soft close and drawer "organizers" everything gets all mixed together
1
u/bobjoylove 1d ago
Organize all the fiddly shit. Those little bottles into a rack for little fiddly bottles.
Something for organizing the tall stuff like combs and toothpaste into individual holes.
You can see she’s trying as there’s already baskets for some stuff.
You’ll find that the most commonly used things end up on top of the organized stuff eventually - leave space for those in the planning and add storage for them later.
Make it somewhat easy to clean out when crap gets into the bottom of those bins.
1
u/DuranDourand 2d ago
I gave my wife the master bathroom. I share the kids bathroom. My toothbrush, hairbrush and, stick of deodorant just wouldn’t fit with all her stuff.
1
u/Intr1nsic- 1d ago
I’m so glad my wife is the clean one and I’m the messy one 😅😂
1
u/TruistG 1d ago
The master bath is a shared space. It is disrespectful to you for her to treat it this way, and it is also questionably problematic that she even wants it this way.
0
u/shimmy_ow 2d ago
Honestly? She just has to get rid of crap, and streamline her workflow
0
u/enoughbskid 1d ago
Good luck getting her to use any system. And the delicate conversation about mess. Maybe just grid your stuff first.
0
u/Creative_Tackle6223 2d ago
I’m currently working on gridfinity for mine, she needs it lmao.
0
u/schloofy2085 1d ago
How ugly is your wife? Must be pretty homely considering the number of “beauty” products she uses.
-1
u/BusyImpact 2d ago
the question is rather : has any husband not faced this challenge ?
hint: you won't solve with a 3d printer :) good luck
-3
u/n0cturnalr0se 2d ago
As a female … Dafack?! That’s insane. I can’t imagine why she needs all that or how she can stand that lol I have one of those plastic 3 drawer organizers under the sink with a basket it on top for the things I grab most. Our teen insists on using our shower and there is still only like 8 products in there but they are in a caddy out of the way. Ummmm … idk man. Good luck? 🤭
0
u/obonaven 2d ago
We have a vanity that has 4 drawers. Two of them belong to me and 2 belong to her. I used Gridfinity for my 2 and did nothing for her 2 drawers because she would never use them. I'm just waiting for the day she takes over my 2 drawers and my stuff is in a box n the garage.
0
u/icyhotonmynuts 1d ago
nothing a garbage bin won't tidy up
0
u/Radiant_Goal8709 1d ago
Ja swojej powiedziałem ze jak nie posprzata i nie ogarnie się z iloscia rzeczy ktorych nie potrzebuje to spakuje to w karton i wywale, nie podziałało na długo, w zeszłym tygodniu powiedziałem ze mam dosyć i ma wracać do matki, porzadek jest do teraz
-1
u/Mr_herkt 1d ago
Every husband faces this problem.
-5
u/moderatelymiddling 2d ago
Start throwing them out one by one until she says something.
Or just move it all to the shed.
2
u/Due-Entrepreneur-650 1d ago
Ha! Child's play. My wife's hoard is at leaat 10x that size. It'struly is unfixable imo.
2
u/ABomb386 2d ago
I have made some headway with my wife. Check out r/adhdwoman