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I'd been looking for something to store my growing pen collection in for a while but the boxes that I saw were either too small or too expensive. Then I came across an oak, 7-drawer cutlery cabinet at a local auction which was a bit bigger than I was looking for but seemed ideal for vintage pens. The date engraved for the original owner on top of the box was 1874. They took a lot of care when engraving brass plates in those days. I stripped out the cutlery fittings and tried to make inserts to carry pens. However the inserts I made looked a bit crude and unprofessional but looking around I couldn't find any suitable liners for sale in the UK. Eventually I purchased some vacuum-formed trays from Gary at gopens.com in the US which fitted perfectly as shown in the photos. The liners are 12" x 16" and I have a few left for future projects. The drawers are graduated in depth, with the top four ideal for pens and the lower ones great for storage of ink bottles etc. Room for my collection to grow.

This very well-made wooden chest is available seasonally at Costco warehouses in most of the USA. I do not know if they appear in other countries' stores and I have only seen it on costco.com once a few years ago. Cost is US$100. Not as many drawers as the Harbor Freight unit but it's made of higher quality materials and shows better construction. However, you can get the HF unit for much, much, much less if you watch their stores and flyers carefully: $80 msrp, get it at a sale event for 25% off = $60, sometimes you can apply an additional 25% coupon = $45.00. At that price, do your friends a favor and buy three! http://t.harborfreight.com/tool-storage/tool-boxes/eight-drawer-wood-tool-chest-94538.html