Moodboard Monday: Sewing Studio Storage

Organizing a sewing studio can be a tricky, and seemingly never ending, task. Today I have some unusual and unexpected ideas to help corral your bits and bobs, all while looking good!

For me personally, I want my studio space to be beautiful as well as functional. I want an inspirational space that isn't too visually distracting. A studio where everything has a place and I won't waste time hunting for supplies and tools. And especially a place where I can focus on the work and not on how much I hate how disharmonious something looks or how hard something is to find.

I spent almost two solid months last year going through every last thing in my studio, category by category. It was the first time in over 15 years and it was time well spent. I gifted or donated things I no longer needed. I threw away art that I wasn't happy with, and I evaluated everything. And everything that stayed now has a home, I can lay my hands on anything at a moment's notice, and I make a concerted effort to put things back when I've finished using them. All of this is saving me time, aggravation, and money. It used to be easier to just buy another ruler/spool of thread/thread snips if I had searched all day and wasn't able to locate it. Need a blue seed bead or a gold ear wire, yeah, I've got that right here!

Because my studio is outside of my home in an old factory the public is frequently invited in, through workshops that I offer, a mentorship group that I lead, or during open studios that all of the artists in the building participate in. Plus my studio is a place where I spend a lot of time and I prefer spending it in a space that is pleasing to look at. My space is not only designed for working but can also be a classroom and a showroom (and a place to hang out and talk about art and eat ice cream, as one does...)

I've rounded up some containers and organizing items that you might find helpful when organizing your own studio. Links are provided below.

1. Bisley 5 drawer cabinet - This metal cabinet is the perfect size for a tabletop and the flat drawers hold a ton of little items like beads, threads, scissors, and more. There are even inserts for the drawers  available with different configurations of compartments to sort all of the little stuff out. Plus the cabinet comes in a range of luscious colors!

2. Rotating hardware bin - This metal bin spins around and can keep spools of thread, flosses, buttons, paint bottles, and glues right at your fingertips. 

3. CD or DVD cabinet - if you collect fat quarters or other small yardage amounts of fabric, then a CD cabinet can be your best friend. A cabinet like this uses less than a square foot of floor space, but holds a ton of fabric (neatly folded and easy to see, select, and use).

4. Picture ledge - Don't neglect the wall space when organizing supplies! A picture ledge or two (or four!) can easily store paint bottles, spools of ribbon, large cones of thread, and much more without using any floor space.

5. Glass curio boxes - lidded boxes can be beautiful to store colorful and pretty supplies like thread, washi tape, ribbons, even scraps of fabric. And the lids keep the dust out.

6. Watchmaker's cases - these little tin cases are ideal for beads and findings. The clear tops make it easy to find exactly what you're looking for, and they're so shallow that it's easy to scoop beads right out of them as you're working. They're available in a lot of diameters. I have four drawers full of beads in these cases in my studio and I LOVE them!

7. Sugar dispenser - this one is a little weird. I know you're wondering why and how, but stay with me. The humble yet classic sugar dispenser is perfect for twine, string, yarn, and thin ribbons. Simply pop a cone of string into the dispenser and feed one end through the pop-up top. Pull out what you need, trim it off, and leave the end sticking out and ready for next time. They're inexpensive so this is an extremely cost effective organizing tool, especially if you have a lot of string, yarn, or twine and use it frequently.

8. Magazine racks - using the wall space again, you can keep reference books, patterns, and magazines at hand with a magazine rack or two. Bonus points if there's a label holder on the front of the rack so you know what's where!

9. Kitchen rail systems - another storage-on-the-wall device, this time using a kitchen rail system. There are a wide variety of systems available with different components that you can add to them to create a system that's perfect for you. Use the hooks to hang rulers and scissors, cups can contain pencils and markers, shelves can hold pin cushions or adhesives.

A terrific and free space planning tool available for desktop computers and tablets (and even smartphones) is Roomle. You measure your room and then draw the walls of your space, add windows and doors, and then add furniture. You can resize the furniture to duplicate what you have (or what you're planning to acquire), then drag it around, rotate it, and figure out how best to lay out your studio. You can duplicate and save multiple versions of the same room to help decide which might work best for you. It certainly saves your back from actually lugging all of the furniture around! You can even switch to 3D mode and take a virtual walk around your room to see how it feels.

If you're looking for even more ideas for pretty studios and storage solutions, please visit my Studio Inspiration Pinterest board for more thoughts (and lovely pictures). What's your favorite unusual storage gadget? Scissors in a knife block? Bobbins in an ice cube tray? I want to hear all about it. Together we can organize all the things so we have more time to sew and paint!!

Moodboard Monday: Here comes the sun(room)!

Do you have a sunroom, also known as a Florida room? I had one in my previous house and I commandeered it for my studio. It was a big, gloriously light-filled room with walls of windows on three sides and four skylights overhead. Most sunrooms in colder regions of the US, like here in the Northeast, are considered 3-season rooms, sometimes because they lack a heat source, and sometimes because all of those lovely windows make it difficult to keep warm. I consider it a fair trade-off to have a room flooded with sunlight that's usable most of the year.

As I mentioned in a few previous posts, I've taken on some interior decorating clients and am having the time of my life. I love flexing my creative muscles, whether by designing and printing my own fabrics, teaching a class full of eager surface design students, or heck, even decorating cookies. Mmm, cookies... One of my favorite things to do for a client is to create a moodboard of the space they'd like help with. A moodboard is a mock-up of the major elements of a room so that the client and I can visualize what the finished room will look like. I decided to imagine that I was decorating a sunroom for myself and created the moodboard pictured here.

A lot of people tend to decorate a sunroom with a tropical or beach theme, but I prefer something more "placeless", a room that would fit in with the rest of my house, which isn't at all tropical or beachy. I would want it light and airy, breezy, and inviting, while remaining true to my modern, eclectic, artsy, global vibe. If you're decorating a sunroom, here are a few things for you to think about when choosing finishes, furniture, and accessories.

• Consider lightening the floors - a bleached wood floor is light and airy looking and helps reflect all of that gorgeous sunlight.
• Choose durable fabrics and materials - an indoor/outdoor carpet is a perfect choice for a sunroom.
• Pick a light, pale color to bounce back as much of that natural sunlight as possible. Pay attention to the undertones in the room - do the colors of everything else in the room lean toward yellow, or red, or green, or blue? Try to match those undertones as best you can for the most harmonious result. For example, nearly all of the blues in my moodboard (from the walls to the rug to pillows to the painting) have a dose of green in them.
• Add lots of texture for interest - smooth surfaces like glass or metal, nubby fabrics like raw silk and linen, rattan or wicker (in moderation or you'll tip over to tropical in a hot second!), and handwoven textiles for pillows and throws can bring another dimension to a room.
• Make sure you have multiple light sources for after the sun sets too - a spectacular chandelier, a couple of floor or table lamps, and a few candles in lanterns can all extend the use of the room beyond the daylight hours.
• Don't be afraid to mix wood tones or metal tones for a more eclectic look.
• Use sheer linen or cotton curtains that will catch the breeze but stop the rays of the sun from getting in your eyes depending on the time of day. There's nothing so charming as a curtain gently wafting in a light wind.
• Don't forget some plants and flowers to really bring the outside in, blurring the line further between outdoors and in.
• Once autumn arrives swap out some of your easy, breezy accessories for ones with cozier textures like wool and velvet pillows, warm brass and gold accents, and more candles to maximum use out of what might end up being your favorite room in the house!

In case you're wondering where any of the items I've used on the moodboard came from, I've provided a shop-the-look list. Do you have a sunroom? Do you love it as much as I did mine? And don't feel sorry for me, my studio now is in an old factory so it has 10 foot ceilings and huge old factory windows - I'm still eating up that sunlight!! If you're looking for further inspiration, check out some sunny Florida real estate for additional ideas!

1. Shibori Dots Indoor/Outdoor Rug; 2. Antique Zinc Metal Riley Lanterns; 3. Seagrass Barrel Stool; 4. Capiz Lotus Pendant Chandelier; 5. Morning Walk Painting; 6. Hughes Sofa; 7. Ocean Basin Tray; 8. Perdana Coffee Table; 9. Sunshine Accent Chair; 10. Fransisco Wool Cube Pouf; 11. Amber Interiors Woven Pillows; 12. Diamond Star Gold Glass Vase; 13. Surveyor Floor Lamp
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Loft Office Design

Carlos and I recently moved to an old loft complex near our art studios. I've been mulling over the design of the new office/guest room space and have finally arrived at a plan.

Things may change a bit as the room comes together, but it feels good to have the general direction decided upon. The first step will be painting the walls a warm white (already started!), followed by building a desk the length of the room (11.5') with two work stations, and cubbies/shelves over it, like the inspiration photo in my moodboard above. I'll be on the lookout for a midcentury modern sideboard or dresser for another wall to house office supplies and give our guests a little storage space. A convertible sofa will be great for overnight visitors and provide a place for a snooze or some work, depending on the day. I desperately want to replace the current "boob" light in the ceiling with an updated sputnik-type chandelier and have found a great, reasonable source for it. Now to save up some pennies! Here's a quick "before" photo of the room (yeah, that green is outta here):

While the living and dining rooms of our loft have brick walls, wood beams, and lots of character, the bedrooms have less character and no bricks, but do have really high ceilings and are large rooms. The furnishings and textiles in the office/guest room will give it the character that it needs.

Here are peeks of the living, powder, and dining rooms for a hint of that charming loft character.

I'll share progress photos and furniture building and sourcing tips as we go, so please check back!

Custom Built-in IKEA Billy Bookcases

One of the more fun projects that I've tackled lately has been customizing some IKEA Billy bookcases for a client. I've got the skinny on how it came together, in case you'd like to try something similar. I don't have the glamour-shot "after" photos yet with the perfect styling and the new rug so I'll be sure to update this post when I do.

We started with four of IKEA's ubiquitous Billy bookcases in a space off of their kitchen that was newly designated as a library.

They had just purchased new comfy reading chairs and wanted to use their existing pedestal table. I created a moodboard, or collaged image, of what their space could look like with some changes. We knew we wanted a new rug and lighting above the bookcases, as well as some fun detailed woodwork.

We were on track for a cosy area to read and relax, except for one minor detail. Behind all of those bookcases was a length baseboard heating, causing the bookcases to sit out from the wall about 6" and not allowing us to anchoring the bookcases to the wall to prevent toppling. So I built a base or platform for the bookcases to sit on from 2 x 4s bolted securely into the framing of the house and the floor below. This ensured that there was no weight on the heater itself and that the bookcases would be supported and flush against the wall. I also ran electricity from the existing outlet to a new switch that would be hidden inside a shelf and a new outlet near the ceiling for the lights that would be installed above the bookshelves.

Here are all four bookcases securely fastened to both the newly-constructed base and the wall behind them. They are also screwed to each other in a number of places for stability and to keep all of the front edges even. I used metal L braces on both sides of the bottom of each bookcase to secure them to the 2 x 4s that they're sitting on. I like to build things rock solid with no possibility of failure, so I add fail-safes wherever I can think of them. It might be overkill, but I sleep better. 

You can see one light in place as a test, and the new outlet peeking out above the third bookcase. The homeowner had made a hole for a power strip in that same bookcase, but it didn't end up being in the right place for the new switch (which is camouflaged just to the right of it) so that got patched.

Once the bookcases were secured I created a soffit above with a frame of 1x2 pines and added  painted planks of wood in different colors, trimmed it out with moulding, and installed the four new lights. The switch inside the bookshelf behind a picture frame controls the lights. I loaded all of the books back on the shelves, staged the table with a vase and flowers, and stood back to admire the work so far.

So the top of the bookshelves looks great, the bookshelves themselves look fabulous, but the bottom is looking a bit unfinished. To remedy this, first I trimmed out the opening below each bookcase with pine and stained it to match the bookcases' finish. I also stained all of the visible parts of the 2 x 4s that make up the base (which hadn't happened yet in the photo below).

Because I wanted the heat from the baseboards to be able to reach the room (there is a wood burning stove just out of sight to the left, so it is really warm there, but still), I purchased metal grating to cover the openings below the bookcases without blocking the heat. I cut them to size and spray painted them oil-rubbed bronze. Those got nailed in place. Then I added trim around each of the grates, mitering the corners.

The fronts of the bookcases were also trimmed out in lathing strips over the areas where two bookcases meet vertically so that the units appeared more custom and built in. You could no longer see four individual bookcases, but rather one large unit. I added a 1 x 12" pine board to the left side of the last bookcase, notching around the baseboard, to complete the custom look (not pictured, but I'll take one from that angle the next time I'm there and post it). In retrospect, I should have painted the baseboard heaters (and maybe the floor inside the base) a dark brown color so they wouldn't be noticeable through the grating.

After using wood putty to fill of the nail holes, I stained everything with a Kona brown stain to match the existing finish on the Billy bookcases. It's hard to remember that the actual bottom of the bookcases is way up in the air, hidden under all of the trim work. Stay tuned for the stunning "after" photos!

Pattern Play

I've been experimenting with pattern in the studio lately. I designed and made some large blocks for block printing.

Often the first thing I'll do with a new block is print it out with black paint on white paper to play with the repeats and secondary designs.

Next I'll test out some paint colors on colored backgrounds. I start with white fabric and paint a wash of acrylic ink and water to achieve the color I want. Once the background is dry, I'll mix and apply paint to my block and start printing. Here are some recents results:

As you can see, I like to keep the colors fairly close in family, or neighbors on the color wheel. These designs will end up as home decor items (pillows, lamps, etc), wallpaper, and more. I think the rabbits are my favorites so far!

One Room Challenge - Week Five: The Home Stretch

This week in One Room Challenge news I've discovered that if you work all day on projects in your room that by the time you're ready to snap some pics you've lost the light and are reduced to taking iPhone photos with the room's lights on. Oof, sorry! You can catch up on all of the other participants of the One Room Challenge and read more about it on the Calling it Home blog.

This week I completed the desk area, updated a sorry-looking filing cabinet, and gave the room a touch of light-hearted whimsy.

My clients' filing cabinet had seen better days but I knew that a little TLC could perk it up and help it look like it belonged in the beautiful new room.

The filing cabinet was wood and had modern lines but it had suffered an uneven paint job while the top was laminate and had seen better days.

First up was touching up the paint with some glossy black latex paint and adding handles to the drawers. I couldn't find the shape and size handles I wanted in a gold finish so I bought silver and spray painted them. When I ran out of gold metallic spray paint after the first coat, I bopped over to Lowes for a new can. To my horror I discovered that the local Lowes no longer carries metallic gold Rustoleum spray paint. At all. WTH, Lowes? Every other metallic color is there, but even the shelf tag for gold is gone and the helpful paint department guy had no idea why gold was discontinued, only that it was. You guys need to get on that, Lowes, a girl's got to get her gold on!

Next up was constructing a new top for the filing cabinet. I basically built a hat that fits snugly over the existing top. It's made of ash and maple and stained a rich walnut color.

The squared off edges of the new top take it right out of the 80s and into this century, while also making it compatible with the room's mid century modern furniture. Check out the side by side difference.

The final touch was building a simple riser for the printer to sit on, that would store excess copy paper and add a pop of color to the desk side of the room.

The next project for this area was all about adding some whimsy into the space. My clients' son, the occupier of the room currently away at college, is a star athlete and has many sports trophies. I wanted to add a nod to the trophy idea without altering his actual trophies. I hunted down some vintage 4H trophies on eBay (see what I did there?) and went to town with an orangey coral spray paint.

I love the levity of the rabbits and the cheerful color they are now. Adding something fun and unexpected to a room gives it so much more personality and takes it away from catalog perfect and cookie cutter. Go bunnies!

If you remember last week, I marked out the location for two shelves over the desk. This week I hung them and added storage containers, art, and accessories. The shelves and brackets are from Ikea, as are the tailored, tweedy boxes.

The desk lamp is a placeholder until I can find something more interesting and I'm also on the lookout for a stellar chair.

Here's hoping that I (and all of the other ORC participants) can make it across the finish line next week. It's been a wild ride - and so much fun to see what the other participants are up to!

One Room Challenge - Week Four: the desk area and textiles

Week four of the One Room Challenge is upon us! This week I was in Houston Texas teaching classes in recording your videos, a social media boot camp, and how to get published in books and magazines, among other things, so there wasn't as much progress as there was last week and as there will be next week, she said with confidence.

I'll be block printing an original design on fabric to make a throw pillow.

A quick trip to Target yielded some gorgeous choices for sheets, pillows, vases, bowls, and more.

Right before I left I had a chance to map out where the shelves would go over the existing desk. I marked the studs with painter's tape and planned the heights for two new shelves.

And I'm waiting for this interesting lot of vintage 4H trophies to arrive from a seller on eBay. Just wait until you see what I have planned for these!!

One Room Challenge - Week three: Dresser and Nightstands

In case you've missed the shenanigans of the beginning of this One Room Challenge that I've undertaken, go here for part one and here for part two.

This week we refinished the dresser and gave the vintage mid-century nightstands a day of beauty. The dresser is one that my client loves - and with good reason, it has great lines and is a solid piece! It had been used in her sewing studio and was purple at the time and had silver handles. Here it is in its purple glory in the former studio (another room that's in the midst of a major makeover!)

I chose a gorgeous deep blue shade for the dresser and my client jumped in and painted it.

I also chose some striking brushed gold handles to replace the outdated silver ones.

Here's a tip when painting furniture - add a little bit of Floetrol to the paint (found in the paint department). Brush strokes will flatten out and you'll end up with a really smooth, professional finish. My friend Tracey Anderson of Finished With Style shared that with me and it makes all the difference. I pour some of the paint into an empty container and then add a bit of Floetrol and mix well before applying the mixture with a brush or roller.

The only photo of the nightstands I have is an iPhone photo that I shot the day I started, my apologies - both for the grainy photo and the original Kermit the Frog green wall.

The nightstands were very dry, the finish was dull, and there were a few rings on the tops from drinks being left on them. I rubbed a coat of Feed N Wax into all of the surfaces of the nightstands, let them sit for about 20 minutes, polished with a clean cloth, and they came right back to life. Feed N Wax is beeswax, carnauba wax, and orange oil, and it smells good and works miracles.

I'll leave you with a sneak peek of the dresser in the room with the vintage mid-century mirror hanging above it. Art is even up on the wall! 

Next week is going to be tricky because I'll be in Houston teaching for 7 days starting on Monday, but I'll have at least a preview of what's coming next in this makeover.

Check out the other over 170 guest participants in the One Room Challenge, as well as the 20 invited participants. There are some amazing makeovers happening out there!

One Room Challenge - Week Two, in which I build a headboard

It's week two of the One Room Challenge (you can read more about my first week and the beginning of my project here)

This week we painted the room. I chose a warm moody gray that reads blue-green depending on the light and the time of day. The color is an HGTV Home for Sherwin Williams color from Lowe's called Silvermist. It's the perfect background for all of the colors and textures that I'll be introducing to the room.

This week I also built a headboard to attach to the metal bed frame. I've added a tutorial below in case you'd like to build one too. I was lucky enough to be able to construct the entire thing of wood that we already had leftover from other projects (score!) but I'm including all of the wood on the materials list if you need to purchase yours. Not everyone has a huge pile of leftover wood just hanging around waiting to be used. Left outside, causing the neighbors and passersby to gossip. Count your blessings if you don't and bop over to the lumberyard to buy your wood! It should cost less than $75 total, which is a steal for a queen-sized headboard.

Materials:

• Four pieces of 1" x 4" x 6' pine boards
• Two pieces of 1/2" x 1.25" x 8' pine moulding strips
• One package of thin tongue and groove pine paneling (Lowe's sells a package of six 8' boards for about $17)
• Kreg jig (you could join the wood pieces other ways, but this is MUCH easier!)
• Kreg screws (I used 1.25" coarse thread screws)
• Walnut (medium brown) and Kona (almost black) stain
• Nails, a hammer, and a nail set, or a nail gun
• Sandpaper
• Wood glue
• Water-based polyurethane and a foam brush
• Bolts and nuts that will fit through the holes on your bed frame
• Drill and a drill bit the same size as the bolts
• Wrench

I determined that I wanted the headboard to be 48" tall and 60" wide to fit a queen size bed frame. I cut two of the 1" x 4" x 6' pine boards to 48" long for the sides of the headboard. I saved the ends (just shy of 24" each) for the inner braces. I cut the other two 1" x 4" x 6' pine boards to 54" long for the top and lower pieces of the headboard. I laid everything out on the floor of the garage to check the size and scale.

I used the Kreg jig to make the joining holes in each of the pieces of wood, and then attached the frame together with the Kreg screws. The advantages of the Kreg jig joints are speed, ease, and the tightness of the joints. I'm a fan!

Once the frame was assembled, I cut the tongue and groove paneling boards to 54" long each. Save the leftover ends to piece the length of the very bottom rows, which won't show because they'll be below the mattress edge and the pillows. Starting at the top and keeping all of the edges flush, begin nailing the paneling boards to the frame of the headboard. I used a nail gun but you could use fine nails, a hammer, and a nail set to recessed the nail heads for a cleaner finish. If you use the same paneling boards that I did, you'll notice that I used them upside down, that is, the back of the boards is what I used facing front. I loved the smaller grooves on this side of the wood (and this wood was leftover from another project so the fronts were already painted - see a peek of it below).

I carefully nailed into the grooves so the nail holes wouldn't be as noticeable.

Once the paneling was nailed on, I took the headboard outside for an all-over sanding to prepare it for staining.

The first coat of stain was much too light, so I ended up mixing two cans of stain together to get a darker, richer color.

Once the stain was dry, I measured and cut the 1/2" x 1.25" x 8' pine moulding strips to fit around the two sides and the top of the headboard, mitering the corners. Before I attached the strips to the headboard I stained them with a dark, almost black, Kona stain and let them dry.

Once the strips were dry, I added a bead of wood glue to the top of the headboard, positioned the top strip in place and nailed it. I repeated this with both the left and right sides. The back of each moulding strip was flush with the back of the headboard so the front edge protruded forward of the front of the headboard, forming a nice frame.

Once the headboard was completely assembled I coated it with three coats of water-based polyurethane, sanding between each coat.

I lined the headboard up against the metal bed frame and marked the holes on the wood.

I drilled holes where I made the marks large enough that the bolts would go through. I attached the headboard to the metal bed frame with three nuts and bolts on each leg and tightened them with a wrench. I threaded the bolts through the wood leg first so the head of the bolt was on the back of the leg and the nut was on the inside of the metal frame. This enables the headboard to sit flush against the wall without the bolt ends gouging the wall or getting in the way. It did make it a little trickier to tighten the nuts down, especially the ones below the box spring. Picture me on my stomach on the floor, with not enough light under the bed, tightening those nuts by feel. Copious cursing in several languages helped.

A shot of the back of the headboard - the paneling was leftover from a planked feature wall that I built in my clients' dining room! I used the planks on the headboard on the reverse side because I liked the grooved detail. It's fun having that surprise in the back of the headboard and it's even more fun that I used leftover wood to make it.

Here's the headboard attached to the bed frame, in place in the room. I love the colors and how clean and modern it looks!

And here's a sneak peek at the new headboard with the pillows - I couldn't resist seeing how it all looks together. I'll go into more depth about the room's textiles in another week.

I just heard that the rug arrived. I found an amazing deal on the CB2 website (6' x 9' rugs are harder to find than 5' x 8' so the hunt was extensive) but the rug was backordered, so it's a relief to know that it's arrived. Trying to pull this room together, between building things and waiting for things ordered to arrive, in six short weeks is nerve wracking!