Apothecary Brush Drying Rack — hangs brushes bristles-down

Apothecary Brush Drying Rack

A rack that hangs makeup brushes bristles-down over a drip tray.

2 parts · 176 × 78 × 219 mm · 301 g · no supports, no hardware, no glue. Assembly is dropping one beam over two posts.

The problem it is actually for

This is the one makeup problem with a real failure mode behind it. A washed brush stood bristles-up runs water down the handle into the ferrule, the glue softens, and the brush starts shedding. Every brush-care guide says the same thing: dry them hanging, head down.

Nothing prints a rack that does it. So: a beam with six slots, two posts, and a tray underneath to catch what runs off.

The grip is a wedge slot, not a hole

Brush handles run about 6–12 mm and no single hole fits them — the reason every printed brush holder is either loose on a slim eyeliner brush or will not take a fat foundation brush.

Each slot tapers 13 mm down to 5 mm over 22 mm, so every brush slides in from the open front edge and catches at its own diameter. At 9.4° per side that is well inside PLA's friction angle, so a brush pushed in stays put — it is a wedge, not a spring, and nothing has to flex.

Slot mouth ....... 12.6 mm takes the fattest handle Slot throat ...... 5.4 mm holds the slimmest Taper ............. 9.4 deg per side, over 22 mm Slots .............. 6 Hang clearance .... 172 mm rail underside to dish floor

172 mm of clearance means a 190 mm brush hangs clear of the tray floor with room to drip.

Two parts

drying_rack_tray.stl 1x 176 x 78 x 209 mm 239 g tray + both posts drying_rack_rail.stl 1x 176 x 38 x 10 mm 61 g the slotted beam

• tray — the drip tray with both posts standing on it, printed as one piece. Fluted shafts, flared capitals, and a pinnacle finial above each.

• rail — the slotted beam. It drops over the two tenons and lifts straight off to load; the finials taper, so it slides up over them without fighting.

It cleans out

Lift the rail off and the tray is a plain open dish — nothing standing in it, no lid, no ribs. The dish floor runs out to its wall at 45°, so there is no square corner to trap anything: pour it out, wipe it, done.

Every one of the six slots is checked to sit over the dish, not merely over the rail. The dish has to stop clear of the posts, and at the obvious slot pitch the two end slots sat 2 mm outside it — those two brushes would have dripped onto the worktop.

Printing

Two plates, neither needs support, and both print in the pose the STL is saved in. 0.2 mm layers, 3 walls, 15 % infill.

The tray print is 209 mm tall on two slim posts. Slow the outer wall down if your printer rings — but do not add supports: every overhang in either part is 45° or steeper, and that is measured off the mesh rather than assumed.

The photos are a single pink-to-gold gradient silk PLA, one spool, no colour change.

Assembly

1. Print both parts.

2. Stand the tray on the counter.

3. Drop the rail over the two tenons. It rests on the capitals and the finials stand proud above it.

That is the whole assembly. To load: lift the rail off, push each washed brush into a slot from the open front edge until it wedges, drop the rail back on.

Parametric

The OpenSCAD source ships with it. Slot count and pitch, the two slot widths and the taper length, post height, tray footprint and dish depth are all named variables at the top of the file, so the rack can be re-cut for however many brushes you actually own.

part= tray | rail | assembly | loaded | section | exploded.