Session 6: Welcome to My Studio

Welcome to My Studio. Let me show you where my latest designing journey has taken me. Did I get the studio of my dreams? Did I get my perfect studio? No.

Wow. That wasn't what you were expecting to hear, was it? It's not the perfect studio because of the house, I had limitations. The basement was one with the way it was constructed and the layout of it, and trying to maximize the space. Two, I was trying to combine it with multiple use areas.

Three, it's downstairs, and doesn't have a lot of windows like I would have liked. And four I had to make compromises, but that's okay. Do I like my studio overall? Yes, it's a wonderful space, and it means a lot to me because both of my sons and my husband built the area, my one son in particular was very involved with the design and gave me some thoughtful ideas and was very helpful. How could I not like it when that's going on?

So let's take a look here. This was the final design that I showed you. This is the way that we decided we were going to go. We're all set, right? Nothing is in concrete until it's finished.

There were some last minute changes that we made and they were actually some good changes. And so I want you to be prepared for that, that there may be changes as you go through it, and you're actually putting it together that you decide work better for you. First of all, was that there is no door on my stairs. We decided to leave it open just to give that bigger feel, so it wouldn't feel claustrophobic when you came down the stairs, you came down the stairs and you went right in with no door. Second, in this space here where the post is at the bottom of the stairs, you're gonna see it in a minute, we built a small wall here, took a little bit of space and made it into a bookcase that I use to hold some of my sewing books and special family mementos to again, try and incorporate the two spaces together.

Under the stairs, coming in this way under the stairs, we went ahead and carpeted in there and put a little light. In time, it'll be a storage area but right now it's a wonderful little playroom for my two granddaughters who are right now, three and four, and they just love going in here and playing which is really fun. And it also brings them down into my sewing area a little bit more often. The lighting, I didn't get the lighting of my dreams, that was a bad call. I should have stood my ground and I didn't, but that was on me.

But that is something that can still be fixed. And again, I only have this one little window here and it's a window well so I really can't see out, it's looking at a concrete wall. That's something I don't like. I would have much rather had open windows. I've got another little window here over the bar area but it just doesn't let in that wonderful natural light that I would have liked.

Function-wise though, it's great studio and I'm glad we put the time into doing the design work. We probably spent at least a couple months nailing out the design and working it before construction ever started. So with that in mind, let me show you the finished results. Again, Welcome to My Studio. This is the view as you come down the stairs.

There's only so much you can do to make an area look good especially with a long arm machine. That's the first thing people see when they come in and they go, "Oh my gosh look how big it is." Because it is four feet wide for the head and approximately a 12 foot table, I've got a massive gamble in there with the Statler Stitcher, and it got the 30-inch throat. So it's one of the big monsters, actually, excuse me my table is 14 feet. So it takes up a good portion of the basement, but I try to make it as welcoming as I could. And one of my thought process when I designed this even though I think I would have liked the cutting table closer to my sewing area, I figured if I had the cutting table closer to the bar if people put drinks or something on that table or food, It wouldn't be the end of the world.

I don't want anybody getting near my long arm, I don't want them bumping it, and I certainly don't want food on it. So that was a consideration. As you come down the stairs I put the bookcase here and this is a big open area. I've got, Oh, probably six feet or actually more than six feet of space. Cause my credenza is six feet of walk space which gives a feeling of openness.

It's easy to move, it's easy to get to my books, and it gives kind of a pretty view with the accessories coming in. As you turn to the right, this is where you see the built-in bookcase that we added next to the stairs. So you walk in and turn, you can see where I've stored my books and I've got some little family mementos and pictures and pictures of the kids and the grandkids up there, just a little bit to give it some interest. I want you to pay attention particularly to the walkways. I've got that good three feet plus for a walkway and actually in here, I think it's closer to four almost five feet because we do use this back closet for storage and getting the big boxes for the Christmas tree and other things out.

I wanted plenty of room to get them out and be easy to move. There's my long arm area, and I've used underbid storage to accommodate the customer quilts and other works in progress if I need, you can also see that I've storage for my batting underneath. I have a good friend and she has what she calls the bat room. She actually turned a closet into an area to hang her batting on roles inside the bat room, so different things that you can do. As you look at the photos, you can see the lighting all the way down.

My ceiling is the whitest white that I could find. The pictures here, the colors aren't totally true representative, it just didn't come out as well in the processing. But my background here, my background paint on the walls is a very pale silver gray. I went with that color because I didn't want a lot of conflict with the things on the walls, and especially when I have client quilts showing I want the focus on their quilts. I also wanted this to be a light bright space because I'm in the basement.

The carpeting is a gray tone carpet. As you can see in my shelving, I did paint a darker color of a gray in the background to kind of pop the shelving and give it depth. And this also picks up on the color, that's back in the bar area. Again, I don't want to show you my work stations. This is the long arming area.

And as you look down, this is my baker's rack and you'll see this in a different photo. And this has been fabulous, I've got manuals and books and notes on the bottom shelf. I've got a bunch of baskets for my tools. And then on the smaller shelf, I've got more tools, I've got my bobbins. It's got a space here, a shelf that's wood, that I can write notes on it, I can have my work orders there, I've got my calculator there.

I've got my computer keyboard for the computer there for operating the long arm. It just it's been a good accessory, a good buy. Notice my trash can, I have trash cans everywhere. That's another thing you can't enough of. I've got one here, I've got one by my sewing station, and then I have two in the cutting area.

You'll see those in the next picture. Just down from that is my ironing board on its dedicated circuit. And then across from it back behind the long arm you might be able to see is my large Janome 1600, that is a straight stitch only machine that I use a lot. Opposite of the long arm is selling central if you will. My layout changed, we weren't able because of putting in this extra wall I sacrificed being able to put one more diagonal table in there and put the other sewing machine in.

It was worth it to me though, to get that bookcase. I use the bookcase a lot, I needed the storage. So cutting it back ended up being a good on the fly decision with my construction team. You can see that I have my TV there and I've got my computer printer and file cabinet here, works very, very well. There's my serger with my task lighting from the OttLite and my sewing machine.

You're going to notice that each of my sewing stations I do have a cutting mat just because I do a lot of cutting on the fly, and it's nice for also having a ruler like this to make quick measurements on things, so that's something I do. This is my sewing chair, it's by a company called Heavenly, they design chairs specifically for sewers, and I absolutely love it. It has been a good purchase. Again, the trash can right there. So this is an area...

As you can see, I've got some of my quilts up, they make me happy. It's great for my customers to look at and see the quality of my work. But I've also got a couple of blank areas here that can be used for future quilts. This is the ironing area. As you can see, I've got the water, the squirt bottle, the press cloth, everything that I need.

I have a steam generator, iron and a larger ironing board, that's all there on its dedicated circuit. And then this is a compressor. I have an air compressor in here for blowing off the rails on my long arm machine, and it's a good thing to have if you have a long arm. Let's move down to the cutting area. This is at the opposite end of the room down straight from the long arm.

This cutting table has been wonderful. This is something you can easily construct yourself. These are cabinets that I got at a home improvement store like a Home Depot or a Lowe's, they're just standard cabinets, they are very builder grade. They are not, you know, high-end, I didn't pay a lot of money for them, but they're a good sturdy cabinet. And they are in a maple, which I like because it was a light color.

My husband built the drawers here, and I'll show you a better picture in a moment to hold my threads. The whole table is, Oh gosh, I think it's eight or nine feet long, and it's about six feet wide. I would have actually liked it to have been bigger, believe it or not for one I'm trimming quilts but this works very well. I bought an oversized mat. There are several companies that you can buy them that are a lot longer and bigger.

It originally fit my last table, which was shorter. We had it overhanging and it was shorter, and I had it pushed up against the wall because in my last home I just didn't have the room to walk all the way around. This was one desire that I had for this studio was to be able to walk all the way around the table and use the storage on both sides. For that, my husband bought three quarter inch piece of wood, we painted it white so that it would show nice and bright underneath the clear mat. And then we put edge molding all the way around to finish it off.

In the last house, we actually took two doors, solid wood doors, put them side by side and anchored those to the table. And a door is, Oh gosh, a good inch and a quarter thick inch and a half, so I had a very sturdy top. It was a very good solution, but this time I want it to be wider, so we went with the solid oak top there. Two very easy solutions, and it just has been a fabulous area. As you can see I've got my baskets in here.

My personal preference, I don't like a lot of things out, I don't like things getting dusty. I don't like to clean. I'd rather be sewing than cleaning. If it had been my perfect sewing room these would have been built behind beautiful wall cabinets. There wasn't enough room and money was also an issue.

I will show you another issue with that in just a second on another photo. This is looking in toward the bar area and into the family room. You can see I've got my quilt rack there to show off some of my quilts. And also it's a nice place for the family to be able to grab a quilt and cuddle up on the couch. So let's look at some of the storage that this particular cutting table gives me.

First of all, it's the the storage for my threads, my long arm threads. So my husband took a piece of a three quarter inch plywood and put an edge on it to make it look pretty, and then he cut the peg board and glued that on. And then into the peg board he placed a little wooden dowels and glued the them in. And so my thread sits on the dowels and I can just pull these out they're on glides and door slides. And it is a wonderful place so that as I stand here with my clients with their quilt on the table, we can just reach in and pull out multiple threads and play with them on the fabric to decide what's going to be the best color.

It also is just across from the long arm, so it's very easy access to grab the threads and go quilt. This has been a fabulous idea. And then he put a little handle on it for me to pull them out. I have used this for the whole time that I've been long arming which has been, for, oh, golly gee, what are we going on 15 plus years? So this was a great investment and it's held up very, very well.

This is looking down the side. You can see that I put pegboard on here, I've got this on both ends. And on the opposite side, both ends, as you could see it was a good use of the side of the cabinet. He put some spacer boards in there so that there would be enough room for the hooks to go in, to hang things, and I've got all my rulers arranged on here and all of my specialty rulers in templates. Fabulous, fabulous thing.

That is just one of the best things we ever did. Again, this is point of first use, I'm using it constantly. In these drawers, I've got my rotary cutters, my pattern weights, my scissors, my sheers rather and underneath is where I store large flat bats. I don't use them too often but I have a few that I keep for clients. Those who are in their large yardage.

I've got overflow of threads in here in some boxes, and I also have a thread rack that I put on the inside of the door. On the opposite end of my cutting table. I've put the underbed storage and it holds works in progress for me and other assorted items. I've got storage that I can put my cutting tool in there. And in here I've got my Accu, what is that called?

AccuQuilt Cutter, and I've a garbage can, I also have another garbage can on the opposite side of the cutting table and it pulls out, you can't have enough garbage cans trust me. So that has been a very good addition. On the opposite side of the fabrics is this pullout, and I use this to hold my stabilizers and a lot of my information for embroidery work. And so we just added the hook, and then this is a little pull out cart or shelving unit that you can buy at the local home improvement stores, and it's just on glides and easy to mount. It's same thing with the trash can.

They're just accessories that you can buy and pull out. And you can see there, the rulers hanging on the other side. Again, back to the fabric storage. I didn't have as much space here, this is just short of three feet. I'm a little tight.

That's why we could not build in the cabinets because you would have doors on the cabinets that would have to open, and it would be very, very awkward and uncomfortable trying to get in and out and past a person or even past the cabinet tree when you're trying to grab your fabric. So we left it open, and you can see it's also been a cute place for being able to personalize. I've also got room, I've got a basket here with more stabilizers in it. Again, the baskets give a little personality and serve a purpose. The storage, why I like it so much.

As I learned at Quilter's newsletter, it is perfect for pulling out and seeing my fat quarters. They line up and I can get three rows of fat quarters in very, very easily. It's also good for Yardages. These are smaller yards, they are probably up to a yard each, these are deeper baskets that I put them in. I also have some over here that are larger backing Yardages.

So I'm talking maybe three yard cuts that I've been able to fold up and put in here. These baskets hold a lot. There are ELFA is the brand, E-L-F-A. I found them at the container store. They are pricey, but they've been worth every penny.

And again, they have lasted me going on 15 years which is more than worth it. I also like to cut strips. When I'm done with a quilt I oftentimes cut long strips like you would get on jelly rolls. And this is a perfect place to store them in the smaller basket, the baskets may be about, Oh three inches tall, and they slide in and out and I've got several baskets that are nothing but strips. The rest of the baskets are great for holding works in progress or planned projects if I've already picked fabrics but I haven't got around to cutting them out.

I'll put those in a drawer. So I really, really have enjoyed this particular system. Going back to the long arm, I want to show you, this is my one and only window there. And I do have a plant on it. I love plants and it just gives me a little bit of green in there and feels a little better to me.

You can see my different baskets that are holding my different tools. You can see the workspace there that I have, that's just enough for taking my notes. I love the oversize window shelf I put, throughout the house we used granite on our windowsills. Number one, the dogs can't scratch them but more importantly, they're very, very easy to clean and wipe off. And they're very, very durable and we just use scrap granite and had it cut for the window sizes, so I've really enjoyed that.

Again, I use baskets a lot, this whole scraps of fabric that I used to test my tension on the edge of the quilts. This holds squares of batting that are often use, if I don't have enough batting on the side to test the tension. I also use the batting to clean the long arm with little pieces of it. But you can see I've got my pins, I've got the markers, the fabric markers for adjusting colors. I've got all my bobbins up there.

It's just a great, great, great system, and a couple of little fun mementos to keep me happy during the day. Point of first juice. Here we are at one of the sewing stations, this is where the Janome is. In each of the drawers coming down, I have things that relate to that machine. I've got the owner's manual if I need it, I store other things in there obviously, but in the top shelf is my bobbin ring, it's a great way to store your bobbins and keep them neat.

I've got some pins in there, my snips, and as you can see my needles and my different accessories. This is just a simple little drawer organizer that I found at an office shops, such as Office Max, Office Depot, it's been a very, very good little organizer for my sewing station. As you can see more snips. This is part of the cutting mat that was on the table that we had to cut off. So rather than throw it away we cut it down and I use it there.

Works great. This is by my larger sewing by the Janome, again point of first use all the different accessories, these are other draw organizers that I found. You can often find these in the kitchen areas of stores. These are kitchen cabinet organizers and it just holds a wonderful array of tools. But I love these little bins for holding my needles and being able to sort those in particular.

I've got my rippers, I've got my point turner, my stiletto, my little wooden iron that I use for quilting, just gives you some ideas of what I put in there. Going down from that drawer, I have thread in the rest of them. This is one of the drawers with my embroidery threads. Again, you can see, I use those kitchen drawer organizers of different sizes to hold the thread. And it's just worked wonderfully well.

If you go into my family room, here is my design wall. Yes, I took the whole wall. Bigger is better when it comes to a design wall. We use soundboard it's covered with batting. And then on top of the batting, I covered it with a heavy duty flannel, a very thick flannel.

And I went with a very, very neutral color, so that would not compete with quilts especially when I'm doing design work. I wanted to really see the quilt itself. And this is a very pale cream. I had kind of a pale gray in my last house which would have been my preference, but it was almost a taupe but I was not able to find it, it had been discontinued. So this was the color I went with.

We have nailer boards up on the wall and then we screwed the design wall into it. And you can see, I use quite a few screws. The reason I put batting and flannel on it is because I come over and when I put the quilts up, I steam them to make sure that everything is square and looks good. And then this is just a work in progress and I can tack up my notes or whatever next to it. This is track lighting, that's coming down on the design wall.

I love it because it gives me plenty of light. More importantly, I can take photos of my client quilts there. Behind this is where people can sit or people can view the wall, it also leaves it very open and gives a big feel to the family room. And it doubles as a nice little flannel board when the girls come over and they want to play and put their little story flannel pieces up on the wall. They just think it's wonderful.

Now, I'll show you the good, the bad and the ugly. I do have overflow storage, it was that cabinet toward the back, and it's not as neat as everywhere else. And yes, I still need to clean out and get rid of some things. But this area holds things that aren't used as often a little bit of extra fabric. My sleeve board, I don't do as much tailoring as I once did but I still have it.

I've got my patterns, I've got my different boxes here that I've labeled, so I know what's in them. They're ugly, I'd prefer something else, but for right now it works, but it's got my lace, my interfacing Christmas crafts, those sorts of things, all of my according for home deck, some pillows for home deck, all of my business records. So this is, Oh my embroidery unit. So this is what I've done with my overflow area. It's a good place for keeping my sewing machine case that I take to classes and traveling.

And these right here, I want to show you these are grab-and-go baskets. And the empty spot is because I took two out that I could photograph for you. I love these, they have little handles that come up so I can carry them. They're a large oversize basket in them. I've got a lot of different boxes, again labeled, this has the drawer organizer, it's kind of...

In this area, for me it was whatever works and gets the job done just so I can get the stuff out of the way. They're not used as much, and we're set to go. In my fabric vault, as my son calls the storage room over on the side that you can't see over, this way, there's actually a big Home Depot bucket. And in the bucket, I've put my long rolls of tracing paper and pattern fabric for making patterns and some of my larger long arming tools, and I've got long yardsticks hanging up. So it's just kind of looking at a space being created and seeing what you can do.

A couple of things that I wanted to point out to you before we close this off is... On my book case here, this was a think out of the box. I really didn't want a tall book case. I wanted something where I could display artwork, and in the last house I had a windows that were above it and I couldn't block it but it was the only place I could put a bookcase. I happened to find this credenza that actually is for for buffets, and I love it because it's got a chicken wire in the front entry doors, so I can close it off.

My books aren't... In your face kind of books, it's an interesting piece, and it was just perfect for being able to display things. Books are my weakness, so I really wanted to control the clutter with my books. As you can see, I've got specialty items from my friends such as the, above the window there's a little stitchery that says welcome to my sewing room, that a friend of mine who's in her eighties, embroidered for me. So that was special.

And I've got, you know, the little quilts that I've made and you know a little bit of whimsy with the bears climbing out of the baskets. I love baskets, I love vases. So I've showed some of my things. My artwork here is actually a quilt that is incorporated into a mountain that I thought was very, very fun. So I've tried to incorporate some interest in my room while keeping clutter at a minimum and limiting the dust surfaces.

But don't be fooled, when I work, I make a big mess. I have fabric thread stuff is flung everywhere but it easily cleans up and could look presentable when company comes over. So I hope you enjoyed the tour of my sewing room and that you've gotten some good ideas that you can incorporate into your space. It is some work, it is some effort, but I will tell you it is well worth the time to create the perfect sewing or quilting studio for you.