When the new year rolled around I got my usual urge to reorganize, but this year I really, really reorganized. We replaced the 9-year-old bedroom carpet in my studio with some office carpet that wears well, I completely moved furniture around, and I threw out…quite a lot. I wanted the space to feel more open, and even though I have a LOT of craft supplies…I wanted it to feel as contained as possible.

This was the disaster area that was my studio when I started this project over Christmas week. I took down the orange fabric-covered corkboard squares, which I put up when we first bought the house in 2007. And I added more wall brackets where the cork was, to make a better, longer wall of shelving.

There were a lot of sticky tabs to scrub off, that’s how I hung the cork.

I had wall brackets on my one orange wall, too, and I took those down, spackled, and did some touch-up painting. 

This was the room after the desk came out, before the shelves came down, and with the old carpet.

I love the new carpet. It’s just so tough and still nice to walk around on.

Okay, so this was the wall next to the window before, with my desk under the window and around the bend. It was two IKEA tabletop desks with open cubby shelves for feet. Which were really impractical, I traded those out for new table legs, too.

This is that wall now:

That orange drop-leaf desk (from IKEA, with a Dalek decaled on) holds my vinyl cutters, those supplies, and some other crafty stuff.

I put the three extra sewing machines–the serger, the embroidery machine, and H’s little pink machine–on bookshelves.

And I just weeded out a lot of stuff and tried to pack it in as neatly as I could, leaving a little bit of space for new stuff as I get it.

The two closets in this room also got major cleanups, so I’ve got more space there. These fabric boxes that used to be along that wall are now in a closet.

This was the old view under the window:

And now:

I got another IKEA tabletop desk to put under the window as a separate cutting table for my sewing projects, which has been a huge improvement. I was always cramped for cutting with the machine and the mat on the same surface. And I got rid of the weird orange velvet IKEA curtains and just put up some blackout shades.

The orange wall, my favorite thing about this room, used to be hidden behind a ton of bookshelves and wall shelves.

And now it’s my desk.

With space for my work and home laptops, and some supplies, but a lot of white space to work with. More than I used to have. 

The sewing desk is a lot less cluttered, and I replaced the open cubby table legs with actual useful drawers under the sewing desk, and simple legs on the main desk. 

And I hung stuff on the walls, but did not put cork squares back up. I have one bulletin board covered in my favorite things from the old cork squares, all neatly contained in a framed area on the orange wall. I like that. 

One of our many IKEA Raskogs, now between the two closets and storing a ton of planner supplies and notebooks. 

And I decaled it, because of course. 

And that’s it! A tour of the new studio space, which I’ve been tweaking and working in for 6 months. It’s a much more comfortable space, it’s easier to move and work in, and I don’t get overwhelmed by clutter on a daily basis. Which is good for my mental health. I Marie Kondo’d the pants off of this studio for New Year’s, and got rid of so much clutter. It’s still a packed space, but I love everything in it.