We recently bought a new house and decided to make one of the upstairs bedrooms into a creative space for me. The room is spacious with hardwood floors and plenty of natural light streaming in from two large windows and a skylight.
I have never had a home studio/working space before that wasn’t our garage. In our last house I stole part of our main floor living room to work. The light was nice but there really wasn’t enough room and I was trying to be productive in the middle of our open concept main living area with a work-from-home husband and a young adult child. It was less than ideal.
Now I have an entire room with a door that I can close while working. When the door is closed it signals to my family I am not to be interrupted. This is a luxury and a privilege I do not take for granted. I’ve been working to get the room arranged and organized and thought I would share some of my thought process.
Creative Space Tip #1: Get In the Zone
Think about how you will primarily use your space and set up work zones. I am a maker and work on all kinds of projects with various mediums. For me it was important to have a large work surface where I could dabble in painting small home decor, create with paper and assemblage and to sit and edit videos and do other admin work.
My table is an old workbench top I scored at an antique show and flea market in Springfield, Ohio years ago. I positioned it perpendicular to the windows so I get great side light coming in which makes filming and photographing a breeze with no additional lighting needed (unless I’m filming at night).
I work on small to medium furniture pieces so leaving some empty floor space creates another zone to paint furniture and spread out a bit. We discovered one weekend that this open floor space can accommodate a full size inflatable mattress providing our oldest a place ro sleep when she comes to visit.
I set up a third work zone which I use mainly for working with resin and jewelry making. I thrifted an old green metal work bench with drawers for thirty dollars and paired it with a white stool from my grandma. I placed this zone under the skylight to maximize my light exposure there,
By setting up work zones it also helps me separate my creative projects mentally when I am working on several ideas at one time.
Tip #2 : Organized Hoarder
I will be the first to admit I struggle with organization. I have a lot of parts and pieces which I tend to stash in boxes and forget about (out of sight, out of mind, right?). My solution was to collect old tins and boxes and jars where I can store all my bits and baubles. Not only do the tins corral my junk, but they also make my space more colorful and interesting. Labeling each tin, jar and box will be the final step once I get all the pieces sorted in a way that works for me. I will know exactly what’s inside each container and having all the containers out on display reminds me what I have.
Creative Space Tip #3 : Fancy Storage
In addition to the little bits I collect, I also needed larger storage for bigger items such as paint cans, decoupage papers, transfers and stamps. I store most of my paint in a vintage china cabinet I painted years ago. I originally had the cabinet for sale but it never did find the right buyer so it has stayed with me and been pressed into service as a very fancy storage cabinet.
I also use an IKEA Kallax shelf unit because these things hold A LOT! I like that I can change it to suit my needs. For instance, I added drawer inserts to the bottom row of my unit and added pull out totes to the row above that. This gives me some hidden storage as well as open storage. My goal is to have all my fancy tins displayed in the Kallax so it looks good and holds everything I need in plain view.
Tip #4: Roll With it
I wish all furniture came on wheels. Seriously. Because I paint furniture I wanted to have one wall against which I could stage furniture for photographs. Having a couple pieces of storage on wheels and my easel on wheels allows me to move these items easily out of the way revealing an area I can use for photography. When I’m done, I can easily roll everything back into place. I don’t have to give up precious floor space solely for photography which I don’t do all the time. Keeping supplies on something as simple as a three tiered rolling cart allows you to move them around as needed and tuck them into a corner when you’re done. I found a piece on Facebook Marketplace which someone made by securing an old wood tray onto a rolling typewriter stand.
Creative Space Tip #5: Make it personal
My creative space is still very much a work in progress. I haven’t hung any artwork yet or painted the walls. But… I did prioritize getting my collections on display. I reserved the tops of both the china cabinet and the IKEA Kallax unit as display areas for my whimsical collections of heads and hands. This really makes the room feel like mine and mine alone. Being surrounded with the quirky things that make me smile is inspiring and creates a cozy, happy space in which I love to spend time.
My husband asked me recently how I am able to keep my new space clean when I struggled so much with organization in my previous home studio. Being a messy maker and hoarder of interesting bits, the key for me is everything must have a home. By using the tips outlined here I was intentional about my creative space, incorporating pretty storage solutions and creating work zones for efficiency. Now let the creativity commence!
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