The Drawer of Small Rescues: Ten Makers on the Odd Things That Get Them Through a Rubbish Week

There is a drawer in my studio that I would not open for a stranger. It is not a sexy drawer. It contains a hair bobble, a takeaway menu from 2019, a spare key to a flat I no longer rent and a small plastic dinosaur. When I mentioned it to a ceramicist friend, she said, 'Oh, the bad day drawer.' Then nine more makers said they had one too. So I asked ten of them to open it. Not for a tidy flat-lay. Not to turn it into a wellness trend. I wanted to know which object they reach for when the week has gone sideways, and why. This is 2026. We are all still pretending a scented candle can fix a council tax letter. These are the things that actually help.

The rules of the drawer

The rules were simple. One object. It had to live in the drawer, not on a mood board. It had to have survived at least one clear-out. And nobody was allowed to say 'it sparks joy' unless they were being ironic. The point was not to find the most beautiful thing. The point was to find the thing that does a small, strange job: it reminds you that you have been here before and got out.

What struck me was how few of the objects were expensive. Most cost nothing, or next to nothing. A few are genuinely ridiculous. All of them are handles on a memory.

The objects

Mina, illustrator, Leeds. Mina keeps a chipped mug from her university flat. It is the colour of a bad bruise and the handle is slightly too small. She drinks tea from it only on difficult days. 'It reminds me I finished a degree while working nights and eating oven chips,' she says. 'It is not a nice mug. That is the point.'

Callum, ceramicist, Glasgow. Callum's object is a crumpled Stagecoach ticket from his first craft market. He sold nothing. He cried in the car park. He kept the ticket because it marks the day he decided to keep going anyway. 'It is not a success story,' he says. 'It is a stubbornness story.'

Priya, candle maker, Leicester. Priya's drawer contains a small plastic crab called Kevin. Kevin came from a hen do in Blackpool and has one eye missing. She squeezes him when an email has annoyed her. 'You cannot be furious while holding a plastic crab,' she says. 'Well, you can. But you look sillier.'

Tom, printmaker, Bristol. Tom keeps a spare key to his nan's old house. The door is now a different door, and the key fits nothing. He says it is the most useless thing he owns and the only thing he would grab in a flood after his cat. 'It is not about the house,' he says. 'It is about the feeling of the front door giving way when you were small.'

Bethan, jewellery maker, Cardiff. Bethan has a dried ribbon from a bunch of flowers her mum bought her after a market went badly wrong. The ribbon is faded and slightly mangled. 'She turned up with flowers and said, right, chips?' Bethan says. 'That is the whole memory. Flowers and chips.'

Aisha, illustrator, Birmingham. Aisha keeps a faded receipt from the cafe where she drew her first paid commission. The receipt is for a pot of tea and a flapjack. She had £3.20 in her account when she took the job. 'I look at it and think, you were terrified and you did it anyway,' she says.

Rory, woodworker, Belfast. Rory's object is a bent nail from his first workshop bench. It is rusted and slightly sentimental in a way he finds embarrassing. 'It is a nail,' he says. 'But it is the nail I hit wrong for about forty minutes while I learned that wood does not care about my feelings.'

Fran, stationery designer, Norwich. Fran keeps a novelty eraser shaped like a chip. She has never used it. It sits in the drawer like a tiny monument to the fact that not everything has to be useful. 'I design useful things all day,' she says. 'Sometimes I need one useless chip.'

Jade, photographer, Manchester. Jade's drawer holds a gig ticket from a band that split up years ago. The ticket is creased and the print has gone soft. She says it reminds her of a night when she felt completely awake. 'I do not even listen to them much now,' she says. 'I just like that version of me.'

Ellen, textile artist, Sheffield. Ellen keeps a smooth grey pebble from a beach in Northumberland. Her son picked it up when he was four and announced it was 'a very good rock'. It is, objectively, a very ordinary rock. 'He is fifteen now,' she says. 'He would deny it. But it is a very good rock.'

What the drawer is really for

None of these objects fix anything. A chipped mug does not pay a tax bill. A bus ticket does not stop a client from ghosting you. But they do something quieter. They provide evidence. They say: you have had rubbish weeks before, and you are still here, and you still have a drawer.

The bad day drawer is not a wellness hack. It is an archive of small rescues. Mine is not curated. Yours does not need to be. If you have a drawer with a plastic dinosaur and a takeaway menu in it, that is enough. The point is not to make it pretty. The point is to open it on a Tuesday afternoon and remember that you are a person with a history, not just a to-do list.