Studio: cork board

In the past, the desk area of my office had some metal file folders, which really weren't working. So instead I put up a large piece of cork (28"x90") and got some desktop file holders. In the back of my mind I thought I was going to mess up the cork with contact cement, so the cork was sitting in my office for a long time, but it's finally done!



The how to: I bought two large rolls of cork, placed them flat on a plastic sheet. Rolled on contact cement with a foam roller and sandwitched them together. Used a rubber roller and pressed down hard to make sure it adhered. Cut the cork to the exact wall space using a box cutter. Then using carpet adhesive, spread on a thin amount on the wall and some onto the cork. Lastly used the rubber roller again and my hands to make sure it stuck to the wall.



Enjoying all the empty space before it's filled with notes and inspiration, so I made a pushpin, yarn sculpture!

Office tour on Apartment Therapy

The wonderful Tanya Lacourse came by my house last week and took some amazing shots of my office. Click here to see all the images.

The details

I've had many people ask me about my cabinets. "Where did I get them?"

Well, these are not store bought modules, they were designed by me, and then I had a local cabinet shop build them for me. It was so awesome seeing my ideas being built before my eyes, I think there is video of me dancing somewhere...

I didn't aways have a plan of going local. My first thought was to check out California Closets, but after going to one of their showrooms I realized they make their cabinets out of particle board - a fact that's not apparent from looking at their prices: they're expensive! So after that, I started calling local companies and they offered to make my cabinets with higher quality materials (furniture-grade plywood) at more reasonable prices. Going local surprisingly got me exactly what i wanted for the right price. For anyone who lives in NH/MA the company I went with was Alosso Custom Carpentry, they are located in Manchester, NH. They mostly do traditional stuff, but they had no problem building what I wanted.



What are they made of?

I've had a lot of particle board items in my life and the stuff just isn't made for long-time use. All of my particle board items eventually start to sag and I really didn't want a saggy office. So I got my cabinets made out of furniture-grade plywood. It's a higher-quality plywood than you usually find at the home center, with higher quality veneers and less voids between them. These suckers will never disintegrate or sag! They are spray painted with a really nice smooth white lacquer finish. Super happy with the results!

Office progress: floating shelves

Yay! My office is looking fab. All the big things are finished, next is just trim work, dealing with ugly cords, and making a cork board. The cork board kind of scares me since it involves rolling on contact cement...

So last night my husband put up the floating shelves, wow it's amazing how horrible things made is China are. The shelves don't even line up, and there is no way to fix them. Ok, yes I understand things may not line up, but man give me a way to adjust, ugh. So I just placed items on there to make things look even. Note to self make your own floating shelves! I would have had my husband make them, but I really wanted to see that wall finished. This what I get for being impatient.

Ok back to the positives, very happy with my office. Wished I had done it sooner.



Right before I shot this image I grabbed this wire sculpture I had laying around and stuck it up in the hanging light. It needed some pizzazz.

Office: hidden lighting

The room is big, has windows, but just a bit too dark for my taste. Sooo, I installed some extra lights (with the help of my wonderful husband Al) to brighten up my workspace. Every piece of the "office puzzle" that gets put into place makes me so happy. Next on my list is installing a bunch of floating shelves on the one empty wall, another great storage solution for my art work and thrift store treasures.

Office progress

Had my new built-in installed this past Friday and I'm really happy with it. The room looks so good and has so much storage, hopefully that will prevent me from making that room a mess again. I'm now working on the smaller things like base molding and cabinet lighting. I also have this big wall space that I've decided to fill with some floating shelves to hold my art and other fun objects. I could have made them myself, but I'm just too impatient, I just want to see this room finished!

The green chairs and table were bought off of Craigslist only a few months after I moved in, with all the changes I was going to sell it. Had this idea of a tall table with Bertoia wire stools, for now I'm going to keep it, until I change my mind.

It's here!

Hot damn, it came out even better than I could imagine. When I look at the final result it's like looking at a page in a design magazine! Ok, so it looks really pretty, but the main thing is I finally have some sufficient room for all my art and craft supplies. To think it used to look like this a month ago... yuck...



So happy to have more storage space. This is so much deeper than what I had before and it's all hidden, either in the drawers below or the frosted glass doors above. Very happy.

Office progress

Images shot over a 3 year period

As you may or may not know, I recently designed some more cabinets for my studio and had a local contractor build them. I did this last year, too, for the other side of the room. Since these are not as massive as the first project, the turn around time was thankfully much faster. It looks like they will be installed in a few days, so expect an update soon. I can't wait to get my studio back in order!

My old workspace

In my old apartment, I had put together a nice little studio space. It was cute as a button, with tons of natural light, a big work table and (what I thought was) a lot of storage. But after a few months of running my business out of my studio, the work started to spill out into the dinning room table and the kitchen counter. It's amazing how much stuff goes into making art, packaging it and shipping it all over the world; there's never enough storage for supplies!

Anyway, I'm in my new studio now and I'm still fighting for more storage space. However, I finally feel like I'm getting close to perfect. Besides the new cabinets, I'll also be adding a tall work island in the middle of the room. I'm still not sure what it will look like, since I'm always changing my mind, but I will keep you posted.

Old Apartment: Trying to get Floyd's attention and scaring him in the process

Island location

Destruction & Plans

Ok, back to that mess...

I packed everything up and stuck it in the spare bedroom. Then I had my "do first, think later" tantrum and began ripping that sucker out. It really felt good taking a hammer to that old wood, very therapeutic.

THE PLAN



I'm going to have a carpenter build this for me. This will really help with my office storage issues. Frosted glass doors on top and drawers on the bottom.

Studio explosion

This is part of my studio. I've had plans for a while to rip down the old built-in cabinets and put in new ones with frosted glass doors and sturdy drawers to hold all my art supplies. I was originally planning to work on it in the spring, but our winter has been so mild here in the northeast, that I've decided to start now!

By now, long-time readers of my blog should be experiencing deja vu: Last year I replaced another large built-in unit with storage cabinets and added a large desk area. It's worked great so far, but I still need even more storage space! I'm running a business out of this office and all my materials, supplies, products, etc. have started to accumulate and spill out of the cabinets and into the workspace. Something must be done!

Below: the work I did last year

The house

Things are finally getting a bit normal around here. I'm still waiting for my sofas and mobile to arrive. That will hopefully fill up the living room nicely.


My office is taking a bit longer to work out because of the built-in closet and bookshelf. I feel a bit limited about what I can do: this is the darkest room in the house due to the small windows, and there is no wiring for a ceiling light... I'd like to make some curtains and I'm still wondering what to do with the walls.

Then there's the real wood paneling on the walls. The previous owners told me it was expensive wood and that I shouldn't take it down... I've never been a big fan of paneling, but I'm an even bigger fan of not plastering 12-foot-high walls! Hopefully with some funky curtains I will able to pull the room together. I would love to get my Flower Pot light hanging in there too, somehow.

Check out some pictures of my messy office: