taming the clutter bug

in which our plucky heroine continues to find her way out of the maze...

after spending four hours Saturday with K, the Very Messy Workroom begins to resemble the plan I have always had, that the back wall be a dedicated storage space for craft supplies and equipment.

The idea is that the workroom is not only intended as a studio for metalwork and enameling, and a place to teach, but also the space where when an idea demands to be made, that I will be able to simply reach for the suitable materials and tools to midwife that creation. Considering that I started with a house that had almost no storage infrastructure, that I am not a carpenter nor do I play one on teevee, and that I have some real challenges as far as access to resources, all in all girl is not doing that badly!

The righthand set of shelves will hold everything all sorts of useful things, from glue, tape, and wire, to needlefelting, fabric paint and dye, and weaving supplies and small tools; the labels are made of chalkboard cloth (like oilcloth) and stuck to the cardboard with doublesided stickytape. That way if I want to change the contents, the nice boxes don't get all visually cluttered. It was much cheaper to simply purchase a small length of chalkboard cloth than to either order chalkboard labels or chalkboard contact paper online. The yet unreconfigured lefthand set of shelves will hold metalworking supplies, beads and baubles, and exciting things like vintage enamel backstock and empty film cans (moar enamel storage). A small wooden bookcase or some small chest of drawers that is about 2 ft tall and 1 ft deep, to fit in the undershelf space would really be helpful...

Another eight to twelve hours should see the rest of the workroom in equally orderly condition, which will make teaching workshops later this summer a great deal easier. I have plans to also add a narrow standing workbench to the south wall, that will fold out of the way when not in use, and am thinking about ways to add more task lighting...