7 Tips for a Clean Workshop
Last Modified: November 2024
Sometimes, when you finally get back into your workshop, it turns into a disorganized hellscape. In his book Every Tool Is A Hammer, Adam Savage discusses how you should clean your workspace and organize your tools at the end of every day. Today, we’ll discuss 7+ tips to keep your workshop clean and organized so you can get to the next project.
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Tips In Order
1- Caffeine
Let’s be honest: There’s probably a lot to clean up, so you’ll need caffeine—and lots of it.
2 - Collect
Gather everything that is ’t where it should be in one place. It will be helpful to have a large area to put everything that isn’t where you want things to live. I used my outfeed table, which I want to be empty unless it’s being used to build something. If you’re working out of a garage and don’t mind some judgment from your neighbors (who cares what they think anyway), you can also put things in your driveway or on some sawhorses.
The key here is to collect everything in one place. Don’t worry about organizing or grouping it; get it all in one place.
3 - Purge
Go through your existing shelves, drawers, or storage areas and purge what shouldn’t go into your collection pile. You don’t need to remove everything from everywhere, just what shouldn’t be there. As with the collection stage, don’t worry about organizing; get what’s not where it should be.
You might also have some areas you don’t want to address yet, and that’s perfectly okay. I have paint, finishes, and materials in dedicated places. I didn’t go through that during the purge because I wanted to dedicate time to going through those later.
4 - Clean
While everything is out of the way, you’ll likely find sawdust, so it’s a good time to clean. Sawdust gets everywhere, especially when you’re busy with projects, even if you don’t always see it. Take this rare opportunity to get it out while nothing is in the way. It is also an excellent time to move any mobile shop fixtures around so you can get under and behind them. I promise it won’t take as long as you dread.
5 - Group
It's time to tackle the large collection pile. You’ll need additional room to move things around, so make some floor or tabletop space if required. Don't forget; it’s temporary. Go through the collection pile and start grouping similar things. Everyone's groupings will be different and vary in how granular they are. I made large groups like tools, consumables, and materials. You may find it more helpful to group by the type of use, such as leather work, power carving, or epoxy projects.
6 - Put Away
Pick one of your groupings and start putting things away. Completing the entire group before moving on to another one will help you stay in a single headspace without getting distracted.
You will likely find that you don’t have a specific place to put some or all of a group. Now is not the time to design the perfect storage solution. If there is a temporary space that works, use it. If you don’t have anything, make something quick and temporary for it to go. Make sure you write down the temporary storage places to address later.
I had some miscellaneous items that really should go under my workbench but didn’t have shelves for them. I built some quick shelves out of plywood scrap that will maximize the space. They took 30 minutes to make (including filming everything). They don’t have to be pretty, but they’ll work and go on the temporary list.
7 - List
While you’re cleaning and putting things away, make a list of things you need to improve in your workshop. It’s easy to make a very long list of all the things you want to do and improve, but we’re focusing on the needs of this list.
I originally wrote “outfeed table with storage” on my list, but I already have an outfeed table. The outfeed table can undoubtedly be improved, and I do want to do that, but I have one that works, so I took that off my list. However, we also have a refrigerator in our garage (I couldn’t keep it out of the workshop once we had kids). It needs to be in the garage, but where it currently can be in the way of my outfeed table and blocks off space that could be useful if unobstructed. Moving the fridge to a different place is a need, so it stayed on the list.
A list is good, but an organized list is better. While reading Atomic Habits and How to Keep House While Drowning, I got the idea to organize this list in a 3x3 grid. One axis has high, medium, and low impact, and the other axis has high, medium, and low effort. This grid will help me prioritize which projects are on the list to tackle. If I’m super motivated, I can pick from the high-effort column, but if I’m exhausted and need a quick win, I can choose from low-effort.
You can make this list on paper or digitally. I made a free template for Notion that will get you up and running quickly. Check out the free template here.
8 - Keep it Clean
As hard as it is, try to keep your workspace clean and organized. It will remove friction when you come out to start a project, and you won’t get as frustrated trying to find things if they go back where they belong. You can leave things out while actively working on a project, but a good habit to get into is to put them away before you leave the shop for the day. I know, easier said than done. It’s a work in progress for us all.
