by Robin of Vancouver, BC) about sorting...

Instead of re-stating what the folks above have stated (which is what I
used to do), here's something new that I'm trying:

I got 2 huge boxes (400/each) of holiday cardboard gift boxes
(top/bottom), which are roughly 8"x8"--they are quite sturdy, an have a
capacity of roughly 2x PAB full size cups. The boxes and lids are
sturdy enough that I have them on my racks stacked like books
(vertically), and have used MLCAD to create labels that visually show
what's in the box. Now, I only use this system for bricks I only have
2x PAB quantity... for smaller quantities, I use the Akro-Mils system,

Sorting before some basic things are identified is putting the cart before the horse. The following criteria will impact how one interfaces with a collection:

1. will other people have access to said parts
2. how much room is available
3. do MOCs tend to be bigger/less detail or smaller/high-detail
4. room lighting
5. resources one's willing to spend on sorting system including fixtures/bags ^and^ resorting time
6. adjacent spaces devoted to staging bins while building
7. personal color idiosyncracies or biases (color blindness, most/least-used).
8. typical MOC genre (miniature, sculpture, technic, or mosaic)

Sorting isn't a science. Unfortunately.

The methodologies to sort LEGO elements are as diverse as the collectors who sort them. There are similarities between all sorting systems. The range is from all pieces in the same container (small, active collections) to one type, one color piece per container (LEGO Model Shop comes to mind). So, now that I've stated the obvious, I'll attempt to describe my (somewhere in between) methods.

To start, I have more than 1,100 sorting containers ranging from bins 2" x 5" x 1-1/2" to 30 quart containers. The volume of bins I have is enormous. About 1/2 are "nuts and bolts" boxes - less than 1 quart. About 200 are 1 quart (4" x 12" x 4"). The rest are bigger. This translates to about 400 bins/boxes larger than 1 quart. Hundreds of gallons altogether. I keep about 60 11" x 17" paper boxes full of larger parts like Duplo, Beleville, big bricks, burps, etc.

I sorted bricks and plates by color into the "shoebox" size rubbermaid totes with some luck but recently reversed that and re-sorted all those bins by size instead of color. This allows a quicker access to the smaller pieces of a particular color without having to dig through all the 2x6 and larger blocks. With those bins, I learned a valuable lesson from Tony Hafner. There isn't much in them, leave the lid off and stack the next box on top, save a ton of space on the shelf.

I have 4 "nuts and bolts" chest of drawers with anywhere from 20-40 drawers for smaller and more unique pices but those are pretty much full and I'm estimating need for a few more. At this point I'm going to go for the smaller drawer versions. Anything that outgrows a big drawer in the sets I have will go into a shoebox bin w/o a lid.

I have around 100 shoebox-sized bins, stacked nested without lids as Sean says below, with the larger pieces and basic bricks/plates/slopes. I also have a bunch of smaller bins (maybe 40?) that are half that size, stacked the same way. And then I have some of the flat tackle-ish boxes. 95% of my sorted pieces are stored in one of these three types of containers, all of which fit fairly well in Ikea wall shelves. The big bins fit into a section width-wise, 2 stacks of bins per shelf. The smaller bins fit in depth-wise, with (7?) stacks per shelf. I only have one shelf that has just these- the rest are scattered about (like the Technic small bins sharing a shelf with the Technic tackle boxes).

I started out sorting into large freezer bags. These are strong, flexible and store extremely well.
As my collection grew, I moved to shoeboxed sized Sterilite containers. These hold more parts but consume lots of space.
As my collection got even larger I moved to LEGO buckets stuffed with loose bricks and the old freezer bags stuffed in any empty space, plus the Sterilite boxes.

Now I have settled on large, rollaround Sterilite drawers and sets of Akro-Mills "nuts and bolts" drawers for everything else.

The large drawers are used to store basic bricks in each unique color at sizes of 1x2 and up. For example, I've got a big drawer with all white bricks, all green, all black etc.

There has been quite a lot of discussion about sorting our collections. Please post your methods as pages under this book.