Having been building with Legos since about 1976, the most challenging task has been finding the best way to store and organize all my Lego bricks. I’ve tried all manner of the best Lego storage solutions including various plastic bins and drawers. Most cannot truly sort the Legos into easily accessible shapes and sizes. I also want my Legos organized by color. Nothing currently on the market has worked all that well or has been remotely affordable — until now.
The Lego Storage Challenge
Storing and organizing Legos presents its share of difficulties. Most people are lucky to locate a handful of plastic bins and separate the pieces by color.
That’s a good start, for sure. The best way to store Legos, however, includes a way to break these pieces down even further. In fact, a great Lego storage solution requires several key elements:
- You need to see the Lego bricks as much as possible
- The storage has to give you the right amount of compartments so you can separate each color into different sizes of Lego bricks
- It should be affordable
My husband and I chose to tackle this problem together. We knew we had our work cut out for us. We started with two giant bins of completely jumbled-up Lego bricks. Once we dumped them out onto a blanket atop our carpet, we had something that looked like this:
The Best Process of Separating Legos for Storage in Containers
As with all good projects, you have to decide where to start. For us, that involved separating the Legos by color into large piles. At the same time, we also identified and separated Lego Technic pieces, Lego mini-figures, and pieces that were clear or translucent.
Once everything was more or less separated by color into not-quite-as-large bins, we moved into the final stage. Further dividing the pieces into smaller groups we utilized several key pieces from the HART Tools STACK System. Having tried other solutions, I truly think this is the very best Lego storage organization system you will find for the money.
How Much Does This Lego Storage System Cost?
You may be wondering what our entire Lego sorting system costs. Well, it wasn’t cheap—but compared to what you’d pay for “dedicated” Lego storage, it’s a great value—and much more useful. We used the following HART Tools STACK products in our Lego storage rig:
| Hart Stack | Milwaukee Packout | DeWalt ToughSystem | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Full Deep Organizer | N/A | $64.97 | N/A |
| Full Organizer | 7 x $21.97 | 7 x $49.97 | 7 x $60.99 |
| Full Thin Organizer | N/A | $44.97 | N/A |
| 1/2 Organizer | 2 x $14.97 | 2 x $34.97 | 2 x $32.97 |
| 1/2 Thin Organizer | N/A | $29.97 | N/A |
| Drawer Organizer | 2 x $39.97 | 2 x $179 | 2 x $144 |
| Cantilever Organizer | $24.97 | N/A | N/A |
| Small Tool Box | $27.94 | $79.97 | $65.00 |
| Large Tool Box | 2 x $27.94 | 2 x $89.97 | 2 x $85.00 |
| TOTAL | $373 | $1040 | $1010 |
Add it all together, and we paid around $373 for this Lego storage. Of course, we’re insane and have enough storage for an extensive collection. You can start with just a few organizers and expand over time as your collection grows. Considering many Lego sets cost $100 or more, spending a little to keep everything organized makes sense for those of us who are committed Lego builders.
Of course, if you opt to use Milwaukee Packout, you stand to pay a lot more money!
Storing Legos with a Tool Organizer System
Several aspects of tool organizers like the HART Tools STACK system make them the perfect system for storing Legos and Lego bricks. We like the variety of bin sizes and configurations as well as the fact that the outer boxes stack atop one another and lock together. This lets you efficiently combine all of your Lego storage into one portable system. Most manufacturers even have a wheeled cart that lets you roll your Legos around should you feel the need to take them on the road!
Use a Tool Box or Organizer with Removable Organizer Bins
My primary organizer included the Tool Box with Removable Organizer Bins. It costs just under $22 and gives you 10 removable bins. You get 8 small square bins and two larger 2-space rectangular bins (suitable for longer and larger Lego flats and similar pieces). The lid is clear so you can easily see which Legos you’re grabbing when you pull it off the stack.
I used around 8 of these to handle a large majority of our colored Lego bricks.
I also liked how I could customize the layout of each Lego storage toolbox. With some, I left the large bins in the middle. With others, I placed the bins next to one another. These removable bins make these the best way to store legos for easy retrieval during building. You can pull out several at once and place them in a convenient location while creating.
Using a Dividable Two-Drawer ToolBox for Storing Lego Mini Figures
The HART Tools STACK System (and others) have a two-drawer toolbox. This gave me another way to organize pieces I didn’t feel would benefit as much from being removed from the containers themselves. This ended up being the best way to store Lego mini-figures in my opinion.
When storing Lego mini-figures, you don’t exactly need to pull out a small container and keep it with you. With a two-drawer toolbox, I could separate all of my Lego mini-figures by color. I also separated many of the heads, organizing those by color and type, and then separated the accessories into categories.
Like other two-drawer tool boxes, you can attach this to your other Lego storage containers as needed. This makes it easily portable, and you can configure it as part of your portable “stack”.
HART 18″ Cantilever Tool Box
After sorting through my Legos, I realized that I had a lot of wheels and axles. Our collection abounded with various sized and colored configurations. The HART 18″ Cantilever Organizer provides an excellent way to store those odds-and-ends Lego pieces you need to see. I like this system for those pieces for which you don’t have too many of one particular type or size. Wheels, tires, and axles fall squarely into this category.
I loved how this small cantilevered toolbox had a lower compartment with enough room for larger wheels and tires. The top did a great job organizing smaller tires and axles. This box also (miraculously) stays level even when fully loaded and opened. You’d almost expect it to tip backward, but it held steady while I used it.
This is a unique toolbox that isn’t part of the Hart STACK system—nor does it appear under Milwaukee or DeWalt versions. While it sits nicely atop our interlocking collection, it doesn’t attach like the other Lego storage cases. If all else fails, a traditional fishing tackle box might suit your needs here.
Half Organizer Unit with Clear Lid for Small Lego Piece Storage
I wanted a solution for storing and organizing all of our clear and translucent Lego pieces as well as smaller Technic adapters and hinges. I had collected a ton of them over the years from various kits and sets. A half-width organizer works perfectly. It let me store everything from simple round flat singles to larger radar shields and even 2×2 blocks. This half-width and half-height organizer features a clear lid so you can see the pieces inside.
The Half Organizer also doesn’t feature individual removable containers. Instead, it relies on a customizable grid that you can configure for larger (or longer) compartments as needed.
Two of the HART Half Organizer Units will stack right on top of the Small Parts Organizer.
Is This Really the Best Way to Organize Legos? You Bet It Is.
I may be biased because I’m so vested. However, now I can take out just the Legos I need, easily grab a series of bins based on color, size, and type, and get to work. My next project is to see how closely I can recreate one of Lego’s existing Creator building sets using just leftover pieces! I’ll need to do some customization for sure, but it should be a lot easier now that I don’t have to hunt through a couple of large baskets of Legos to find what I need!
For “extra credit” you can also pick up some larger cases without clear lids for things like large bases and genre-specific Legos. For example, I utilized the middle box of the 3-piece Modular Rolling Storage System to hold our kids’ Minecraft Legos.
