Collectors may typically be seen as people who have too many items that take up a majority of space in their homes. However, they admire that reserved space which has sentimental value. Collecting can be a challenging but rewarding hobby.
Items in people’s collections can range from photo albums, small porcelain figurines and even action figures or toys. Though toy collections are often seen as juvenile, adults enjoy them too, except rather than play with them, many adults opt to keep toys as decorations and token pieces in their homes.
Blind boxes are a recent trend, where a secret toy comes wrapped in a small box. Different types of toys are included in a series, which makes people want to collect the complete set or buy multiple boxes until they get the toy they want. The “Sonny Angel” brand is the most popular among blind boxes. Sonny Angels are figures of naked angel boys with different headpieces and are often sold out at toy stores worldwide, and many have trouble finding them according to the Sonny Angel Reddit community, r/SonnyAngel.
Toy collections don’t just include blind boxes, they can also consist of random cards or stuffed animals or collections of memories that include saving movie tickets or birthday cards.
Lily Wheaton, a geology student at UT, collects many things. It started with Kewpie Babies and rocks, then developed into K-pop albums and uranium glass.
Wheaton collected her first Kewpie Baby in the third grade and enjoyed picking up rocks to collect at a young age. Wheaton’s mom supported her collections and bought Wheaton creepy dolls from the thrift store and even started collecting rocks of her own.
Once Wheaton started collecting, she couldn’t stop.
“Some people may call me a glamorized hoarder,” Wheaton said. “When I was younger, I didn’t have a lot of friends. So, I attached more to things rather than to people. I didn’t have a best friend, but I (had) this collection of things that I (could) organize in this way.”
Wheaton accepted the fact that she likely had fostered closer connections to her collection items than to people in her life.
“I have made the joke before where it’s like my boyfriend could cheat on me and I would be fine, but I lost one of my favorite Kewpies and it was porcelain and it broke, and I cried for days,” Wheaton said.
People usually display collections to admire them and have them serve as hard-earned decorations. However, there is only so much space. Wheaton said that it’s hard to organize everything.
“Right now, I stay with my mom and I have my room. I have to tell myself, ‘I can’t go too crazy,’” Wheaton said. “There’s been times where if I get new things, and I don’t care for it for months, it just stacks up.”
Along with the lack of space, Wheaton said her grandmother would also judge her room, and say that she should box everything up. Others have also judged Wheaton for collecting and have told her that she belongs on the show “Hoarders,” which focuses on people who have severe cluttering issues that risk their safety.
There’s also the anxiety of having to collect every item to complete each collection, which Wheaton said is perhaps because of her obsessive-compulsive disorder. Sometimes, Wheaton can’t afford to buy items and always fulfill each collection, which she said causes more anxiety.
Wheaton specifically pointed out the struggles of having a K-pop album collection, which include random collectible inclusions inside each album.
“It would get so anxiety-inducing being like, ‘I don’t have the money to buy this new album that came out’ and (thinking), ‘I need that photo card for my collection,’” Wheaton said.
In recent years, Wheaton’s collections have grown as a way to cope with trauma.
“There was a notable event in February 2020 that was just super traumatic for me,” Wheaton said. “That (was) a time where some of my other collections that weren’t as prominent started just really picking up and I just started going really crazy with it.”
Wheaton said having these collections also helps create a sense of control in situations where controlling the outcome is impossible.
“You know, if I have control of nothing else, I have control of these objects,” Wheaton said. “I feel like it’s a healthier way of control versus, I don’t know, being an asshole.”
Even if there may be downsides to collecting, like wasting money or space, the feeling of happiness outweighs it all for many collectors. As someone who also enjoys opening blind boxes and random K-pop albums with surprise member photo cards inside, it brings a sort of thrill and excitement that makes me feel better.
It’s also a way to keep yourself occupied– a distraction from life’s daily occurrences. It can be fun to look through blind box reveals on TikTok or seek one to buy yourself. When it seems like there might be a lot going on in the world, at least there’s a new collection item on the way. Every time I open the mail and see a fun little package, I think that I like this little life after all.
