As a new Montessori teacher I thought if I could just find the right containers for my teaching materials, everything would fall into place in my classroom. The kids would make “good choices,” and work like bees in a well-ordered hive. If I couldn’t resolve the pencil poking, the fights over who was first in line—I could at least get my physical classroom in order.

Containers are important in a Montessori classroom because the curriculum is made up of bits and parts that include glass beads, geometric shapes and brightly painted wooden puzzle map pieces. Maria Montessori called the classroom the “third teacher.” When activities are set up in a beautiful and balanced way—not too much, not too little, crisply-maintained—the kids are intrigued and begin to determine what sparks and holds their interest, leading them to discover what they like and who they are.

As a new teacher I was on high alert for round baskets, wooden boxes and rectangular trays at 99-cent stores. I scoured yard sales in search of the rattan, wood and neutral colors Montessorians favor to instill calm—so counterintuitive to the bright shouting colors of most classrooms.

And as a new writer, I felt legitimate when I used a long slim reporter’s notebook for the first time, and fat binder clips to hold stacks of paper I needed to read and edit. Hanging files are great for organizing my notes from work, and folding gray IKEA boxes hold used-up notebooks I want to keep for reference.

It’s hard to imagine Julia Child in a disorderly kitchen or a master wood worker not knowing where he put his saws. We could compare it to the workings of the brain. The memories or insights we need to write lurk in odd places in the brain; one has to catch them quickly. It’s not going to happen if we’re intent on looking for a pen.

Our whole family is big on containers actually. We own too many backpacks, tote bags, pencil cases, baskets and thermoses. We like to reuse second-hand stuff too. At his studio, Chris stores paint, glue, tape, ink and portfolio-making materials (labeled “folio”) in wooden Clementine orange boxes. At a second-hand store, he once picked up a tiny battered tin for his X-acto blades.

It’s not only about finding the right container, but also the placement of the container in the workspace. Many times, the students in my classroom knocked over a basket of rulers until I moved it away from the pencil sharpener. One of my most useful containers for writing is a cardboard magazine file, on a reachable shelf in the bedroom, which holds colorful pocket folders I’m always pulling out to carry papers so they won't get scrunched in the bottom of my bag. If a container is poorly placed, or ill-suited, it’s immediately noticeable and annoying. When it works it almost disappears.

The perfect container can be inspiring, like a work of art in itself—take the oyster shells Chris brings home from restaurants that he uses to hold paint—because its doing its job as well as you’d like to be doing yours. It’s there and not there like the best arrangement of words or brushstrokes on a page. It seems inevitable, and often lasts, even improves, with age.