The Making of a Craft Studio (VI): The Final Reveal!

A few weeks ago was moving day. With the help of Hub’s brothers, all the heavy equipment was brought over from my old studio. While I still have some unpacking, I can’t wait to show you the reveal and share our upcycle ideas to inspire you in your own craft space!

Here is what we started with in the basement….

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… and this is what the same vantage point into my new studio is like now! It’s the only expanse in the house that’s long enough to view the paint chip portrait I did of Hubs. I think it’s only fitting to display it on the drivers side of his beloved beetle!

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Take the Tour

Take this one minute video tour of our awesome craft space!

Upcycled Storage

The cabinets that we upcycled into the VW beetle desk started out life as temporary storage in our old kitchen. We never even got around to putting faces on the drawers! Luckily I saved them when we renovated the kitchen with the intent to repurpose them elsewhere. The transformation has made it my favourite highlight of the work we’ve completed in my craft studio!

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The graphic is a picture of a VW beetle that Hubs restored almost 30 years ago. Now this piece is a real showstopper and amazing storage for my stash; repurposing at its best! Check out how we upcycled kitchen cabinets turning them into a one-of-a-kind VW desk for my craft studio!

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Repurposed kitchen cabinets + the old door from our cold storage room repurposed as a counter top make this storage unit a one of a kind piece!

Humble Beginnings

The counter top had humble beginnings too. It was also the utmost in upcycling because of its several lives before its final use!  You may remember it as the makeshift work top we fashioned out of sawhorses when we tiled the backsplash in the laundry room. It was originally the hollow core door to our cold room and we really put it through its paces when we renovated the basement. It turned out so well as a counter top that Hubs even purchased another hollow core door and cut it down for the desk top right beside the storage cabinets.

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Old door from our cold room got upcycled into a countertop – but not before we used it to tile our laundry room and build the rest of the basement.

Here’s where the door was located in the basement originally. You can’t see it in the picture, but it even had a huge hole knocked into it (which I would assume the kids of the previous owners of the house did). The hole got cut off when we repurposed it.

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Sharing the Laundry Room

My studio is adjacent to our laundry room so there’s overflow from my craft room into that space too. It’s wonderful being in such close proximity to a sink and water where I can clean paint brushes!

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Hubs just finished hanging the doors a friend helped him build on the upper cabinets. It was so exciting to see it finished.

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The glass has a beautiful flowing pattern called everglade. It’s the same glass I used to create a new thermopane panel for our front door. We cut the glass ourselves and installed it with a painted backing to match the walls. It’ll give me something pretty to look at when I’m not busy crafting – and Hubs is doing the laundry 🙂

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Thread Storage

Speaking of pretty things to look at, I decided to display all my threads in a vintage oak glass display cabinet. I still haven’t unpacked all my fabric, so I’ll likely add some of that to the bottom shelf.

Want to show off a few of your favourite threads? You have to see this thread holder!

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The shelf beside the glass cabinet beautifully displays my collection of old irons and a few other vintage cast iron finds.

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I found the perfect glass jar to store my buttons on top of the glass display cabinet:

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The little card catalogue below is the very first one I ever owned. I love it so much that I got a bit carried away and now I have three card catalogues of varying sizes. One of the larger ones is in the sewing room which you’ll see later.

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Photography

The picture leaning against the wall won’t be there long; it’s borrowed from Hubs’ man cave so I’ll have to sub in a different one.  I took the picture in the distillery district several years ago when I was taking a photography course.

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I have about 20 different pictures I’m in the process of framing and will likely rotate them between the man cave and my studio whenever I feel like a change. Now I’m displaying a picture we took at the Naples Botanical Garden. You can be sure there’s a future guitar planter upcycle in my crafting future!

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Vintage Finds

Across from the thread cabinet is an old metal sewing machine base Hubs and I found on one of our antiquing excursions. Hubs painted it and I paired it up with an old wooden board (I’m not really sure what it was in its former life, so if anyone knows, please do tell!).

For my last birthday, Hubs repainted an old kerosene heater and commissioned a friend to paint a scene from our back garden around the front. I’ll be spending a lot of time in my craft studio during the long winter months, so it’s nice to have a reminder of warmer weather and landscaping a dry creek bed.

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I have a few old sewing machines to display also. I may mount them on individual shelves right above this on the wall if things aren’t getting too crowded.

Across from the laundry room is where my cutting table is located. The DIY storage shelf that’s leaning up against the wall is a project that Hubs and I did a few months ago.

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I was planning on hanging the shelf above my serger, but it didn’t work out there because of the hanging pendant light. It’s a shame because now I’ll have to find another place for my wall clock DIY that I thrifted for only $1.50.

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The perfect spot for the clock was on my pegboard shelf, but sadly I have no room to hang the shelf where it will be easy to access! You can never have enough pegboard in a craft room! So instead, make this pegboard craft organizer and we also show you how to hang sliding pegboard. Both these projects are ingenious space savers!

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Open Storage

We found the shabby chic highboy in a thrift store. It didn’t have any drawers, however it’ll be great flat storage for works-in-progress or fabric. I have a few print press letters and trinkets in the old printer drawer shown on top of it that I’ll eventually fill in as I unpack my things.

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Right beside the highboy I have an area for a desk which is simply the other hollow core door Hubs cut down and painted for me (as you saw above). Underneath it, I’ve stored my air compressor.

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Seating

I’m still working on this how to paint vinyl project and the drafting stool below that used to belong to my uncle. Here it is so far:

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UPDATE: The chair makeover now complete; I’ll finally be able to take a seat.

When seated at my cutting table, I can see into the sewing room. I love having the feeling of open space instead of staring at a solid wall.

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Sewing Room

The sewing room houses my card catalogue and there’s task lighting in addition to the potlights to light up the sewing and serging stations. The pendants are on a separate switch and are dimmable, but you can never have too much light in a craft studio! I was originally going to install some vintage green pendants but they weren’t wired and buying these RANARP ones from Ikea was the quick solution to getting it done fast. The beauty of it is that I can easily swap out the white shades for the green ones whenever I want to give me a winter/summer option (the shade is just held on by a clasp)!

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To see how these green shades look in the craft studio now, see our vintage light fixture rehab.

The card catalogue is from a local university. I’m so lucky to have it to store my smaller items. It’s so useful!

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For more storage, Hubs built me an expanse of Ikea cabinets that runs the full length of the sewing room. You might think we went to great expense to buy new, but again, we were savvy about repurposing. While we purchased the interiors, all the doors were found online. If you’re interested in how to plan a storage solution, learn how I designed the one below specifically for my craft room using Ikea’s Pax Planner.

Above the pocket doors is a vintage street sign found on one of our antiquing treks while in the U.S. Where it hangs faces north and it just so happens that my MIL grew up on North street. So the find was a perfect fit on so many levels – not to mention that it looks great! The pocket doors seamlessly close off the sewing room which backs onto Hubs’ man cave.

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Pocket Doors

I’m still deciding what colour to paint the pocket doors! Photoshop helps but the orange is more ‘burnt’ than shown below and the blue is a historic colour with grey undertones. The other options are white to match the Ikea cabinets or a soft black, but those are a bit too neutral for my taste! The colour has to work with the man cave too; any of these colours would work. Let me know which colour you’d choose in the comments section.

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Spoiler alert update: we painted the double pocket doors blue 🙂

I’ll likely add in a few throw rugs here and there; especially in the sewing room so I can freely roll the chairs around without dinging up the wood floors.

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How to Organize a Craft Room

Well, the craft studio is still a work in progress! I’m sure there will be some updates down the road as I finalize my storage options and unpack the rest of my things from the move. Check out how to organize a craft studio and my stash so far!

At least now I can move my crafting off the dining room table and restore the rest of the house back into a somewhat better state of order!

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Craft Room Update

After enjoying my beautiful craft studio for only a short while, it sprang a leak! While we were remediating water damage, it looked like a bomb hit it. The good news is that we rebuilt it again and it looks as if nothing happened! If you have a finished basement, you’ll want to read about what we did to prevent mold after a water leak.

In even sadder news, our basement flooded again and we lost our beautiful wood flooring. So if you ever do a basement reno, see our loose lay vinyl plank flooring installation. It’s the best choice for a wet area like a basement! Like they say, hindsight is 20/20, so learn from our mistake!

Wanting a clutter free look after months of chaos, we ended up replacing the shabby chic dresser with this waterfall dresser (after transforming it of course!).

Pin Craft Studio

Be sure to pin for later:

Now to finish the man cave, which is also a work in progress, so we can finally sit back and relax a little. The basement has been almost two years-in-the-making in total between the laundry room, craft studio and man cave. Hubs deserves a long break after all his work turning our basement into usable living space! It’ll be nice to do nothing but sit on the couch in the man cave and eat popcorn this winter. Of course, with a little crafting thrown in for good measure.

The Making of a Craft Studio Series

Be sure to check out my new craft category, Birdz of a Feather~ Craft Rehab, to see what I’ve been up to in my new craft studio too!

Here are the links to previous blogs in the series:

  1. The Making of a Craft Studio– Calling All Crafters: Help Me Decide the Best Layout for my New Studio
  2. The Making of a Craft Studio (II)– Design Your Space Using Ikea’s Pax Planner!
  3. The Making of a Craft Studio (III) – If You Build It, She Will Come!
  4. The Making of a Craft Studio (IV) – Progress Report!
  5. Organize a Craft Room

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21 thoughts on “The Making of a Craft Studio (VI): The Final Reveal!

  1. Oh my goodness, Sara, what an amazing space. You two have put so much time, planning, thought and creativity into this space. It’s fabulous. I’m in love with the 66 VW bug turned cabinet. What a streak of genius. All your little touches are pulled it together into one wonderful place.

    Enjoy!

  2. PS Regarding the door color, I have a couple of thoughts. I would a) go with the light blue on the doors, but also carry that color over to the wall with the window and possibly the wall with the opening to pull the color between all three spaces. The color also reflects the light and enlarges the space. OR b) find a color that compliments the wooden card catalog and let that pull in color to the room. In that case, I wouldn’t put that color on the window wall, just on the door.

    • Thanks – and thanks for your advise on the door; I think I’m becoming partial to the blue too!

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  4. I’m all in for the orange on the doors that’s my favorite color.

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  6. I love your quirky style! I grew up in farmland, and feel l have to save every vintage piece i see because it reminds me of home. But I don’t want a real “country” feel. I do the same as you and mix vintage with modern. Very wonderful creative space!

    • Thanks; I find it hard to pass up vintage pieces too so I’m happy to hear that you think it strikes a balance!

  7. Wow! I am sooo jealous! ? My workspace is our garage…. but I’m not complaining because for years, I didn’t have anything other than the dining room table or outside. Blue is definitely the color to go with on your doors. The space is very sterile and the blue will clean it up. I like the idea of a neutral rug with bits of the orange and blue mixed in for accent. Very nice space!

    • Thanks so much Susan – it actually looks like a tornado hit it now. I’ve got a zillion projects on the go – lol!

  8. What an amazing space Sara, you will be creating some amazing projects in that wonderful space. I am very jealous 🤣🤣😍

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