With so many products for consumers to choose from, packaging is designed to get our attention with pleasing colors, bold graphics, and engaging text.

All of this visual information is very helpful as we browse the aisles looking for our tried-and-true favorite brands, but once that item is in our home, all of that packaging can become unnecessary visual noise.

A jumble of boxes and bags in various sizes, shapes, and colors looks cluttered, and often results in overbuying because we can’t find what we already have.

To avoid this, we can take a minute to “decant” our pantry and personal hygiene products, as in transferring them from the original packaging into reusable, uniform containers. This allows us to see the variety of goods on hand while streamlining their visual impression.

If we use something all at once when we unpackage it, then decanting is not the best use of our time. But for things that we use a bit at a time, like flour and salt in the kitchen, or band-aids and cotton swabs in the bathroom, decanting makes each time we retrieve the item more pleasant.

There are hundreds of options for decanting containers available for purchase, in every shape, size, and material you’d could imagine, and investing in one durable and beautiful set all at once can completely transform a space. I’ll even help you shop!

That said, I built up my own decanting set little by little over time, with a combination of new purchases, thrifted finds, gifts, and upcycling. My containers are not totally uniform, but they’re not a haphazard mix either; each container is either clear glass or wicker, and they look cohesive even if they’re not instagram-perfect.

Maybe you’d prefer a colorful assortment of identical plastic bins. Great! Do you. A good rule of thumb is to keep one thing consistent across the set, be it the color, the material, the shape, or the size.