Spices have always been the hardest thing for me to keep track of in the kitchen. I'm interested in specific recommendations for    hardware (containers, labeling, shelving, etc.) and  organization schemes (alphabetical? categories?)    in order to make it easier to find the spices I'm looking for.  
Here's what I finally came up with - I'm very pleased with this solution.    The jars are from Amazon.com, the labels are printed using a Dymo LabelWriter Twin Turbo, and the shelf is a 3-Tier Bamboo Expanding Shelf from Container Store.   My recommendations:    Use a label maker if you have one. Having everything printed the same way makes it prettier and also easier to scan.  Using exclusively the same type of containers simplifies storage and also makes it easier to scan.  Put the labels towards the tops of the containers, so they're visible above the tops of the next row down.  This stair-step shelf expands to fit the horizontal space available, and can probably fit  about 60 containers, which should be enough for anyone.  I've gone with alphabetical order, which I've found to work very well. It has the advantage of being objective - there's no question where something belongs, and no taxonomical discussions about what category nutmeg belongs in.    As a bonus, this setup give me pleasure every time I look at it! 