This post is mainly for those who requested before and after photos of this weekend's sewing room upgrade. I took some photos this morning, before I emptied the room (packing it all with Tetris-like brilliance in the sitting room).
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| The cutting end. Shelves packed with stuff and a raised cutting 'table' (board over two Ikea basket racks). Rulers hanging on the wall to the right - plan is to put up a pegboard. The bottom shelf is very narrow, on brackets that are wider than the shelf. The shelf itself is used for rotary cutters, scissors, tailor's chalk and so forth. The extra space on the brackets allows me to 'hang' my roll of calico at the back. Originally I was going to shelve the right-hand wall, and make all the shelves on the back only 120cm (like the top one). But now I've decided on a pegboard, I'm keeping these full width . |
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| Same end of the room. Showing my fabric stash in the Ikea baskets. The Horn sewing cabinet is used for storage. Generally the overlocker resides inside; but I've been using it. On top I have my embroidery machine. The drawers are used for all the 'bits and bobs' that go with the two machines. When my cupboards are eventually built in, the cabinet will not be needed. By which stage it'll probably be close to falling apart. For such an expensive piece of furniture, they are only chipboard. I was given mine; it's been a real blessing. To the left is my small ironing board - on a shelf. I'm not entirely happy with the arrangement, but it works for the moment. |
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| The other, 'business', end of the room. This has an L-shaped bench for sewing, writing, etc. The shelves on the left are very narrow (14cm) and perfect for all manner of things. The shelves on the right are a variety of depths. I was originally going to shelve the back wall as well, but I'm thinking maybe just the pin board and perhaps a small peg-board. Or maybe a large peg-board, with the pin board on it. That way if I get rid of the pinboard, I won't have a silly looking pegboard at the bottom of a great expanse of wall. |
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| Narrow shelves holding a wonderful array of stuff. Ribbons on spool holders; jars of zippers, ribbons, bias, lace, yarn; tools; glue - everything where I can lay my hands on it in a minute. |
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| My 'mainly fabric' wall. Top shelf holds a variety of large containers with things I don't use often. The middle shelf is my scrap stash. 5, 3.5, and 2 inch squares in containers; not sorted, but ready to use for something. The large clear tub on the top shelf is all my "can't cut a 2 inch square from it" scraps. No idea if I can use them for much, but I can't justify throwing them out. Again, lots of access to stuff. Pens in jars, cards, stamps, punches. |
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| Rather dark photo of my window to the world. What you can't see is that this window only has framing on three sides. I'm hoping by the end of the weekend that it will have a proper frame - on all four sides. How novel. The fabric 'blind' (piece of fabric, safety pins and cotton tape) has been an okay temporary measure, but I'm thinking wooden blinds will work better. And if I get "those that build" to create a pelmet shelf over the top, all the better. The white running across the top right hand side is my roll of bag wadding (also shows in the top photo). It's on a too-long curtain rod, which is balanced on the window frame and exposed wall frame (just off shot). A pelmet and a small ledge on the opposite wall will give me great storage for these awkward sort of things. We've got a dozen or more curtain rods in the garage. I hate curtains on rods; much prefer tracks. |
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| Half way through my Tetris stacking in the sitting room. |
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| Same end as the very first photo, with everything cleared out. The front door used to be where the dark patch on the floor is. By the end of the weekend the floor will wooden and the 'seams' in the walls will be invisible. I hope. |
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| The 'business end' with everything cleared out. The room was originally an outside porch/landing, which the previous owner enclosed. Hence, the weatherboards. I've now removed those - one less job for "those who build" tomorrow. So satisfying ripping them out. |
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| The current floor - the old concrete sheeting from the exterior landing. Painted before our time and since ignored. By next week it will be lovely floorboards. The bright square on the right-hand side is the cat flap. I'm a little concerned it might be too low for her with the new floor. |
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| Entrance to the lounge room. Missing bits of wall are from where we moved the wall in while renovating the lounge room. The gap was a full sliding door width. It's now wider than a normal door, but considerably smaller than a double door. |
Well, that's the before photos. Hopefully by Monday I'll have some after photos.
3 comments:
Go for it. It sounds very promising and will be super satisfying.
I am amazed at waht youmare doing with that amount of space. Thats great and will be so rewarding in the end.
Jo, I know it looks like a small space - for nearly 12 years we basically overlooked it as being useful for anything - but it is almost exactly half the size of our smaller bedrooms. The bedrooms comfortably take a double bed (and not much else).
Now that the walls are painted and the floor has a coat of seal on it, I'm starting to feel excited. I had hoped to paint all the trims today - but the hardware stores are closed and we're out of paint . Bad planning.
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