Brad and I moved into our house almost 4 years ago. When we moved in, Brad and I each claimed an extra bedroom as “our room” to do whatever we wanted. Brad’s room has since been changed into a guest room and all his computer stuff moved into our joint office, but I still have my room which is supposed to be my craft room. A couple years ago, my dad built me a wonderful desk for a Christmas present but the room has become a catch all for anything and everything that doesn’t have a home. Over the past few weeks, I’ve been working to converting it back to purely a craft room oasis. Join me now with the fun reveal (and loads of pictures)!
Here are some “before” pictures; you can see how it is the catchall room and there are a lot of things that don’t belong.
I started just by clearing out all the extra stuff, I had about 5 shopping bags full of stuff that made its way to goodwill and also got rid of the Love-Handler (it was a fun toy but not really exercise). Some of the other extra stuff that was in the room included items from when Brad & I were dating as well as items from our wedding. I transferred that stuff into a Rubbermaid container so it can go live in the basement for now.
The next step was to decide how to corral multiple types of crafts. I knew that I wanted to use some sort of shelving and decided on the IKEA Expedit because it creates cubbies and each cubby can have a category. To fill the cubbies, I wrapped banker boxes in fabric; this solution was the cheapest option as well as customizable. I opted on mix-and-matching the fabric to bring different colors and patterns into the room.
Each box each has a specific purpose and is labeled with chalkboard contact paper that was cut out using my Cricut. There is one miscellaneous box since there are some things that just don’t fit into a category. Even my iron got moved up to my craft room and gets its own box; the only time that the iron gets used is while I am doing craft projects so I figured that the craft room is really where it belongs. The teal box up on the shelf was a goodwill find which I spray painted and then added a chalkboard label. I wanted the labels to be changeable because the contents will probably be constantly changing.
I found this chair and slipcover at Pier 1 and am in love with the pattern. I had been using an exercise ball as my chair; it worked, but did need to be re-inflated ever once in a while and tended to be a bit on the low side. When I saw the chair at Pier 1 I knew that it would look perfect. The chair is actually a dining room chair, so while wondering the store; I called my dad to see if I could use a dining room chair as an office chair. He gets a lot of “will this work” or “what type of wood do I need” phone calls from me and fortunately has a great memory and can remember things like what type of wood I have in my house and the height that he built the desk. He verified that the dining room chair would in fact work with the desk so off it went into my car!
The desk is organized with storage boxes and magazine holders from IKEA. I would love to have some different patterns, but the IKEA price just can’t be beat. The Y-Weave Baskets from Target have been amazing and I’m sad that they are discontinuing the product. The green basket that I have on the desk is the XL size which I haven’t been able to find in about a month. I also bought a desktop storage drawer that fits 12×12 scrap-booking paper perfectly. I use this for the main paper storage and the built-in 12×12 shelves are used for storing projects that are in-process and also some paper scraps that aren’t quite garbage but still awkward size. The drawers hold things such as envelopes, embellishments and paper cutters.
I also updated the closet so that it could be accessed easier. I took the “before” pictures after I replaced the standard two sliding doors, but can be seen sitting off to the right in the picture. The problem with the two sliding doors is that you either can see one half of the closet or the either, if the item I wanted was in the middle it was hard to access. I solved this problem by taking down the doors and adding a curtain tension rod. The only thing I might change is to add a couple tie-backs on the adjacent walls. The pictures below show a bit of the organization inside the closet. I have a a container similar to this plastic container to hold all my wrapping paper and was excited when I found hanging gift bag storage. I also have some cube storage to hold my “gift box”. I love having gifts on hand for creating fun gift baskets. As you can see, I have a slight obsession with purses. I like switching out my purse every so often and found this hanging purse storage to store the others. The purses probably should be moved into my bedroom closet, but organizing that closet will be another project.
There are still a couple minor things that I would like to update. One is the blue accent wall, I accidentally painted this room the wrong accent color when we moved in, but I didn’t feel like moving the desk to re-paint it for this project so it is still on the to-do list. The second thing that I’d like to update is the light fixture. I think a cute drum shade or chandelier would be fun, but I haven’t found the right one just yet.
Hope you all have enjoyed a tour of my craft room. I will leave you with the new view from when I walk into the room; I smile every time I walk in now.
Linking up at:
http://www.craftyscrappyhappy.net/
http://www.lovelycraftyhome.com/
http://www.abowlfulloflemons.blogspot.com/
Ashley says
I got that same fabric at JoAnn’s last year to make pillows out of!! That is so funny that it was on a chair at Pier1.
Your craft room looks great…I might be motivated to start cleaning out my catch-all room!!
♥ Ashley
atparsons.blogspot.com
jewelsathome says
Congratulations! You are inspiring me to work on my craft room, too! I especially love the banker’s boxes covered in fabric. I have been collecting boxes to cover, but I think the banker’s boxes look great, because they are all the same size. I also love your idea for chalkboard labels. Thanks for all the great ideas. Hope you have fun creating things in your new space!
Julie
http://www.jewelsathome.com
Ashley says
hey just wanted to let you know that I am doing a giveaway on my blog! go check it out!
♥ Ashley
atparsons.blogspot.com
Jennifer says
You did so great!! Love those banker boxes!! Thanks for sharing at Show & Share last week….featuring this in tomorrow’s party!
Katie says
oh my goodness – I love those banker boxes! great job!
skye @ neathering our fest says
Hi Kendra!
I’d love to feature your craft room but I can’t find your email address. Can you please shoot me an email skyemclain at gmail dot com? I will send you details!
The Thrifty Challenge says
wow your craft room is amazing! I wish i had enough room to have my own. so inspiring. i was going to pick a favourite feature but it’s just too hard. The whole room looks incredible. Great work!
iheartorganizing says
The whole space is incredible, but those boxes have a special place in my DIY organizing heart. :) Wonderful before and afters and great job DIYing something so fab!
xo!
Jen
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Stacy says
Very nice. TFS.
I was wondering, do you have instructions for covering your bank boxes?
I really want to do that in my studio.
Thanks!