Off the Shelf

After transforming the smallest bedroom into my dressing room, and organizing all my clothes along that fab closet wall, the teeny tiny (barely 25" wide!) closet in my bedroom didn't really have a purpose...  I didn't need the narrow bit of hanging storage it provided, and not much would fit on the one little shelf up top.  Eventually, it became a black hole of random things...  the junk drawer of closets!  Fortunately, I forgot to take a 'before' pic until it was all cleared out...

clean slate - even the closet rod & shelf are gone

(Check out the boxed-in chimney taking up half the closet, as well as the awful 'pea soup' paint someone used here & in the entryway.  Who would ever choose this colour?!!)

Anyway, I'm always on a mission to maximize storage in such a small house, so I thought this closet would be more useful filled with shelves.  When 'the Boy' moved in, this project became even more important - I felt kinda bad that he had to keep his clothes in the little armoire out in the hall for months (ok, over a year...)

testing the fit of the new shelves...

After a couple coats of paint, the pea soup colour is gone, and the closet transformation is complete (and yes, I regret not painting the walls until after the shelf supports were in.  They made it pretty tedious!)

all done!

I love the look of a nice chunky shelf, so we added 2" faces to the front of the shelves.  They cover the mdf edge, and hide the shelf supports.

chunky shelves!

The best part is that this whole closet makeover was essentially free.  For the paint I used leftovers from previous projects (the taupe paint is the hallway colour, and the shelves were just leftover white semigloss), and all the mdf was left from an as-yet-unblogged studio project (stay tuned!). 

The shelves hold a surprising amount, too.  I'll spare you the current view of stacks of black work pants & an extensive collection of Bike Week t-shirts, but all of the Boy's clothes are in there now!  There was even space to sneak some of mine in (but just my painting clothes & some pjs, I didn't want to get greedy!)
:)

Fabric Deliciousness (& Storage!)

When I was a kid, I had a Charlie Brown book called Happiness is a Warm Puppy.  Every page started with "Happiness is..." and ended with something awesome.  Like a warm blanket.  Or an umbrella and rainboots.  Anyway, I think the point was to enjoy the small pleasures in life, so I want to share one of mine...

Upstairs in the room I refer to as my studio, I make things. Christmas is coming, and these things I make make great gifts, so lately I've been making A LOT of them. Which means things like this happen:

(AKA bliss in yummy fabric form*)

Just having all these pieces cut and laid out ready to sew makes me very happy. Having the space to work this way - even happier!

(*wondering what those rows of fabrics turned into?  Many of them are hanging out right here)

A long time ago, I posted a little studio organization project I completed, and promised to post pics of my fabric storage... Well, it happens to be fairly neat right now, so here you go!

This is an antique piece my family used to use as a cabinet in our dining room.  Usually I'm more into 'vintage' than 'antique', but this cupboard works really well for storing lots of pretty fabric in plain sight.  (I also love that it has room on top to store all my shipping supplies!).  And yes, it's upside down, but it's been used that way for as long as I can remember - and personally, I get more storage out of it like this!

Unfortunately, it's still not sufficient for storing the ever-growing collection of a fabric hoarder like me...

it's a sickness, people! There really should be some kind of a 12 step program for this! 

As you can see, the bottom shelf of my rolling rack is full, too.  I've gotta say, though, even on a makeshift shelf like this the sight of such fabric abundance makes me happy. :D

As Charlie Brown might say, "Happiness is.... many organized stacks of yummy fabric!"

Through the Looking Glass

It's been a long time since I've made any updates to my dressing room, so I wanted to share a useful little project I recently completed.

Before:  no place to store my jewellery (of which I admittedly have a lot, but I make jewellery - I've gotta model my own product, right?  That's what I tell myself, anyway)

fun fact: I've had this full-length mirror for as long as I can remember. The frame's been painted many different colours over the years, and painting it was one of my earliest 'decor' diy projects. (That first pre-teen attempt was to paint it blue with a black zigzag. No explanation for that one)

But after some sketching and building (and, ok, maybe a little re-thinking and re-building...) I came up with this:

After: Problem solved!  Lots of room for rings, earrings, and necklaces, and the mirror doesn't have to lean against the wall anymore - I even found a mod wallpaper remnant to pretty it up a bit (just $5 for almost a full roll at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore.  Have I mentioned how much I love the ReStore?!).

Rings are stored on pieces of wood dowel set into the pine framework, earrings hang from a metal bbq grill found on clearance and spray-painted brown, and S-hooks are used to hang necklaces from lengths of thin metal rod.

And as much as I love my jewellery, my favourite part is how it all disappears.  As you may remember from here, this room has just about everything else stored out in the open, so I wanted to keep this part of it looking sleek and un-cluttered.  I also think this piece will look even better when I get around to painting over the blah beige on these walls, but I haven't been able to settle on a colour yet. (Suggestions?)

Anyway, though I'm reluctant to think about just how long I've been picking away at this project (it looks simple, but it definitely tested my problem-solving skills!), I think the lesson here is that eventually any project can be finished. Timely, because remember my goal of completing that project I recently gave you a sneak peek of? Yeah, it didn't exactly materialize this weekend.  :(  A few significant steps closer, but still not finished.  One day, it too will be complete!

So, what do you think of my storage solution?  Do you prefer to keep your jewellery out on display?

Organization Makes Me Giddy

There's one room in my house that I end up spending most of my time in, and I'm pretty sure I haven't posted any pictures of it yet (it's late, or I'd check). It's my studio, it's the largest bedroom upstairs, and if you're wondering what it is that I DO in there, have a look over yonder
<-------

Anyway, it's a work-in-progress (aren't they all!?), so I'm not ready to show off the whole thing yet, but I couldn't wait to show my latest bit of organizing/thrifting/DIY awesomeness. But first, let's get the 'Before' mess over with quickly, bandaid-style:


Ugh. Ok, that's all you're getting, and I insist you forget you ever saw that. My propensity for making (or attempting to make) practically everything, means I have A LOT of stuff. And up until recently, no place to put it all.


Now check this out! The two white bookshelves were an absolute SCORE from Kijiji (I showed up expecting to buy just one, it turned out that they had two after all, and I got the two of them for just the $15 I'd planned to pay for only one).

As a side note, for those of you in the US: do you have Kijiji? I only ever see Americans talk about Craigslist...

Anyway, they were in great shape, but since I'm apparently not one to be happy with plain white shelves, I lined the backs of them in this cool 'formica'-like stuff that looks like bamboo (formica=weird, I know. But it was relatively cheap, easy to work with, and I love the look of it!):

(and no, I don't typically store placemats and stemware in my studio. I use these random objects as photo props, and my business cards are just in the glass because I think they look cool)


The fun stripe-y pegboard is super functional, but it's also practical: shelves all the way along that wall would've made for a tight squeeze trying to walk around my extra large work surface that's almost as wide as the room. This way I still get the storage, but it doesn't take up any floor space. (The stripes weren't for function, though. Just like the bamboo stuff lining the shelves, they're there because I think they make it more interesting, and because I can't leave well enough alone.)

Anyway, that's it for now. Maybe next time I'll show you how I store my ridiculous fabric stash. :)

Making an Entrance

So I finally finished my entryway. Here's what it looked like before:


It was the only 'room' in the whole house that hadn't been painted before I bought it. Combine that with the rickety shelves, the sagging wooden closet rod, the large cracks in the plaster caused by jacking it up this past summer:


and the holes made by the electrician who wired in an outside light for me:


and it definitely needed some TLC. What followed was a couple weeks of patching, mudding, taping, mudding, sanding, mudding, sanding, repeat. Here's a 'work in progress' shot:


And finally, the end result:


A fresh coat of paint on walls & ceiling, new shelves and closet rod, the new light, and some DIY key hooks.
Oh, and those stylin' rubber boots aren't there just to look pretty - they're a necessity when it comes time to clean garbage out of the ravine next to my house! :)


Now THIS I want to come home to.

**Update: for those of you who join me in a love of thrift, here's the cost breakdown:
repairing the walls $47.04
paint $23.32
decor $34.48 (includes light fixture, closet rod, shelves, key hooks, etc)
Total: $104.84

All Dressed Up!

There've been lots of changes around this place over the past couple of weeks, but not much is complete yet so I'll have to write more later. This one, however, can't wait...!

This past weekend, I finally got to tackle a project that I've been wanting to do since the very first day I walked through this house. As is common in a house of this age, what closets I do have are pretty tiny, so right from day one I wanted to turn the smallest 'bedroom' into my dressing room. I've been using it that way since I moved in, but in a makeshift sort of way (temporary clothing rack, sweaters in a bag, stuff on the floor - not good!). That all changed a couple days ago!

Here's the before shot (notice the lovely pipe as 'focal point'):


Thanks to the generous help of my dad (he's the carpenter in the family - I just try to be a decent apprentice!) here is the realization of what I've been planning and excitedly waiting for over the last couple of months:


(recognize that ottoman?)

And from the other side:


I love that it fills the entire length of the wall, and makes great use of the space under that sloped ceiling. There's even some room behind all the clothing storage to store things like my luggage - bonus!! I really think it's the best use of the space in that room, while still leaving it feeling open and spacious.

Finally, just for good measure, here's my vanity on the other side of the room:


All in all, I've achieved my goal ('girly heaven'!) - a completely functional space that holds all of my clothes and shoes, and lets me stay organized (and feels like an exclusive boutique!). It was so nice to do a 'fun' project for a change, since so much of what I've been working on this summer is the boring structural stuff (yeah, it's important, but that doesn't mean it's not boring!). I get to enjoy this space every day of the week, so it felt like quite the indulgence!

Speaking of indulgence, the price tag for this entire project came in at $120 including tax (and that includes all the bits and pieces - like screws, etc. - but not the dresser, which I already had), so it really wasn't such a 'splurge' after all. A custom-built closet for the price of a generic closet organizer - score!

Thanks again, Dad. I couldn't have done it without you! :)