Friday, February 15, 2008

My space!!!

For anyone that may be interested I thought I'd blog a bit about "my space" where I create. I live in a Victorian terraced house and our dining and living room has been knocked in to one room. My space is a corner of the dining room next to the window and measures about 6 foot square but I seem to have a huge amount crammed in to that area (as you'll see!).

In the alcove on the right I have a large desk with stuff underneath and then a shelf unit sat on the desk to make the most of the space and a couple more shelves above attached to the wall. Under the desk I have tons more storage. On the left at right angles to my desk is an old bedroom chest of drawers and Neil has fixed an MDF worktop to it so I can use all the space.

Right, my desk! Under the shelf in the baskets I have adhesives, punches, stickles, and crackle paints. The blue drawers on the right house all my rub-ons!

Up on the next level I have magazines and a few idea books then brads and eyelets, chalk sets, MM attachment sets, metal embossing set, glitters, pens, more adhesives and tools. I also have my fab Sennheiser headphones sat here waiting for the time when I can listen to my mp3 player! The pink trays house layouts to be filed and paperwork I need to sort out.

Above all this I have 2 shelves fixed to the wall. On the bottom one I have my metal embellishments in little DIY drawers, then various Prima flowers and Doodlebug glitter. The first set of black drawers has all my ink pads and Pearl-ex. The 4 square drawers hold magic mesh, fabric embellishments, Scrapworks stuff and Junkitz. The last 3-drawer set on the right is wood mounted alphabet stamps and then the few odd wood mounted stamps that I have.

The upper shelf has 8 jars of ribbon sorted by colour, Maya Road chipboardand Ikea boxes - one with Cuttlebug embossing folders and spare cutting plates and the other with reels of sewing thread. Then I have pouches of recent photos to be scrapped, more Prima flowers from bitty bags and then 6 embellishment boxes of various odd bits and pieces sorted by colour. The A4 files hold foam alphabet stamps and the blue drawers on the right are smaller bits of scrap paper also sorted by colour.

Under my desk I have a 3 drawer plastic storage tower which is full of scrap bits of paper and collage type items which I really must try and use some day! To the right the blue A4 storage has all my A4 & letter size card along with various stickers and paper type embellishments and a fair few sheets of vintage Letraset. The 2 files sat on the floor on the right are EZ-mounted alphabet stamps and other rubber with my Sizzlits alphabets sitting on top

To the right of my desk and sitting under the window I have 2 old bedside cabinets stacked on top of one another. The bottom 4 drawers are full of 12 x12" card and then a few drawers of 12 x 12 paper pads. The top drawer I use for throwing in stuff "to be sorted"!

My other 12" x 12" paper is kept "by manufacturer" in plastic bags in this Really Useful Box which sits on top of the printer cabinet.

On the left I have my stamp storage sitting on top of the old chest of drawers. All my clear stamps have been taken out of packets, trimmed down and stored in CD cases. I have a fairly good memory of what I have so have just written the title of the sets on the CD cases. The far left 25 odd cases are full of Studio G stamps which I love! (you can get 8 sets in each case - LOL!). I've also put some old wood mounted sets that I took off the wood in CD cases.

The Asda lunch tims sitting on top of the CD rack hold Marvy pens, Prismacolor pencils, MM embellishments, Heidi Swapp stuff and bling! To the right you can just see my sewing machine.

The chest of drawers underneath holds sewing machine accessories, tools, beads, book rings, 6" x 6" paper pads and card making stuff like envelopes and poly bags.

The pink flowery boxes on the left in the first photo have chipboard, stamp sets that won't fit in the CD rack and stamping blocks.

For Toni who asked what I did with all the cards I make - they're in a great big box upstairs along with my felt, fabric and buttons!

Well, if you got to the end - well done! I told you my little space held a fair bit but I know exactly where everything is and could tell you what make it is and where I bought it from!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

oh wow what an amazing use of space Jo, that is very impressive!!

T. Kaiser said...

You have a remarkable talent for using space! Some day, when your children are off to college, you might be able to expand into one of their bedrooms. Using my daughters room for my studio helped me with the whole "empty nest" sadness I felt when she moved out. However, it's much better to have children at home and stamp in a corner. Thank you for sharing!

Jenn said...

Amazing!!! You have so much STUFF!!! I love it!!! :D

Carolina said...

What a wonderful creative space you have! I love how you organized everything and how you made the best use of it! TFS!

Toni said...

Jo! I love that you shared these photos. Now I can really envision you creating, and this is so much a part of how I connect to other women artists. I'm putting in my request right now, also, for a swatch of that gorgeous light blue flowered wallpaper if you ever repaper or paint those walls. You've really got a system going and yet it also looks pretty.

Eileen said...

Wow! That is so organised. I am lucky enough to have much more space, and I have loads of IKEA boxes on shelving, but the place still descends into (and stays in) total chaos in about 20 minutes flat!

Eileen said...

Wow! That is so organised (and tidy LOL! I am lucky to have a much bigger space, and I have loads of IKEA and RUB boxes (and more) on open shelving, but the whole room still descends into (and stays in) total chaos within 20 minutes flat!