Studio Revamp...the before

So I have posted before that my 'studio' is our attic.
An attic that once sported green shag rug and gold/yellow "Greg Brady" curtains and slipcovers.

An attic with slanted ceilings, painted plank flooring, and old dark dry plywood paneling.

(and a big old mess!!!)

An attic that I willingly share with our household storage and a play space for the Munchkin.
An attic that needed some serious help....

So I set off to re-do my studio - on a very very tight budget.
Repaneling - not an option.
Redoing the floor -not an option.
Buying matching furniture -not an option.

My goal was to increase brightness, clear/hide the clutter, and make the entire space more visually pleasing to work in... not necessarily in that order.

Other considerations were keeping the area near the opening to the stairwell safe, maintaining air flow across the attic (it gets HOT up there), and CLEAN UP MY MESS!!!

I started with the desk/table.

I loved this table when I first made it - it was a combination of legs salvaged from our family dining room table (made by the father of an old school classmate of mine), a door salvaged from the renovation of our kitchen, and a large piece of glass given to me by a former co-worker.

It was big - it was sturdy - and it did the job.

Unfortunately it also sucked up all the light - created glare off the glass top - and created strange storage challenges underneath due to the angles of the legs.

Plus it was so huge that my gate leg cutting table was not able to be opened up and used - so I was cutting on a lower surface than I liked - and this piece of furniture was taking up space being stored but never used, and that just made no sense.  (Other than being a narrow flat surface where things tended to collect.)

I also wanted hubby to cut a table to create a drop-in for my sewing machine - and with the glass top and panel door construction, that was not possible.


Next I tackled the storage... well, the craft storage.  Family storage is uniform in the bins and runs all along the narrow walkway.  Not much is going to change there.

My craft storage consisted of a few dressers and a bunch of bookcases and cabinets, none of which were the same in height.  I liked the shelving options from the cabinets/bookcases, but did not like the cluttered look of them.  Two of the shelves were stacked -creating this high space where stuff got stashed and STAYED - sometimes for YEARS - without being moved.

The bookcases also set up some strange "dead space" corners where things would fall down and I could not get at them.  And things were always being stacked in front of them... one was even providing the barrier at the top of the stairwell - and therefore the shelves themselves were UNDER my desk and pretty much inaccessible.


The next thing was to tackle the wall color.  I knew this paneling was so dry that it would suck down paint in nothing flat - so priming was a must.  Moving all the furniture away from the walls was also going to be an issue.

tune in next week for the results... and the approximate cost of this "design on a dime".