Thursday 14 February 2013

Sewing Room Rearranged

Well, it's rearranged, but it's by no means finished. I still have to declutter and organise it all.

My sewing room has never quite worked for me. Sure, I love having a space to throw all my stuff and hide from people, but the furniture and the layout has never been conducive to my creative processes.
Yesterday that all changed. Last year I had spent quite a lot of time thinking about and writing down what I wanted to use my room for, what storage I needed and what work spaces I needed.

The result of all that reflections was realising that the storage I had didn't work, as it was mainly drawers, and I dislike drawers for storage, especially for fabric. I can't see at a glance what I have, it gets messy when I rummage trying to find something, which means I then forget I have fabrics and buy more.
I also didn't have the work stations I needed, as my worktable was partially taken up by the shelving on top of it. I also just didn't like the table I had as my sewing table.

A friend gave me two shelves recently, which nicely replaced the Scotch chest that I did have (some of) my fabric stored in. I also got a proper sewing desk at the start of the year. I don't use the recessed platform, as my daughter likes hiding inside it too much, and also my new machine is slightly too big for the platform that recesses.

So back to yesterday. While Guinevere was at daycare a friend came over and he helped me pull out all the stuff that was covering the floor, the tables and various other surfaces. We rearranged furniture, putting my cupboard against the wall rather than where it had been hanging out in the middle of the room, the table got pulled out from the wall to form a worktable accessible from all sides in the middle of the room. Turns out the carpet in here is green.... I haven't quite moved everything back in from the lounge yet, but I'm working on it.

This is everything that got moved into the lounge....

All of which I somehow have to try and fit back into my sewing room. 

This is what the room looked like part way through the process
View looking in from the door (with my shiny new Singer sitting on the desk, but more about that once I've tried it out).

Right hand wall of the room. My computer desk, shelving unit with a bunch of my fabric in it and a shelving unit with books, bits and more fabrics on it. Including some on the bottom shelf that need new homes.  

Left hand wall of the room, the small wardrobe unit is shelved, and is full of unfinished projects. Spinning wheel (mother in laws as mine is broken) is sitting out of reach of small hands, as is the iron. The white cupboard you can see is one of those 180cm high ones with a double door on it. Now on the far side of it is a stack of big boxes and bags full of fabric to sort, that is nearly as high as it is, no exaggeration  the stack is taller than I am. 
I forgot to take a photo of the wall beside the door, which has a set of underbed drawers, a small dresser (8 drawers), both of which contain random crafting bits. One entire drawer is ribbons, trims, elastic and bias binding. I think I need to separate it out, as I have to cram it in to close the drawer.  Sitting on top of this is a small glass fronted cupboard unit which is full of yarn, actually, it's only full of the natural fibres. On top of the book bookshelf is a box of 8 ply given to me to make baby blankets, and a box of 8 ply acrylics I use to make stuff for small ones. 

I think you can imagine just how cluttered the room was before I moved everything into the lounge. Really need to do a good cull of the fabrics, I think I have too much to use in any reasonable time frame, plus some I'm sure are no longer to my tastes. Once I've made up and moved up the skinny cupboard from downstairs, which is going where the stack of boxes/bags is, I'll have to go through them. And I know it won't all fit in.


4 comments:

  1. When I first moved in to my new house my sewing room took ages to get right too. It is still evolving now, that's part of the fun for me though :) It looks like you have some better storage solutions now. I prefer open shelves too, love being able to see my fabric and my jars of bits'n'bobs :)

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    1. It definitely is an evolutionary process. Being able to see fabric and notions definitely adds to the creative process, and makes me smile.

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  2. I have much empathy. I started a giant rearrangement of my craft room and although emptying it was easy it took a year to get it all back in, not helped by being given a whopping amount of stuff part way through! You'll get there and you'll be glad!

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    1. I think Gynn would shoot me if it took me a year to get everything back out of the lounge, he's getting twitchy and it's only been two days.... I've just been offered some more fabric too....

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