My sewing room/workroom has always been a large basement bedroom downstairs. I have a large window that looks out on the garden, a store room, and a large closet. When I was working I was always in “make it work” mode. I also got stuck in a rut. It was not very conducive to try different space use things out. Why bother painting when the room gets trashed with dirty tents and gear?

Retiring gave me a chance to rethink my space. One of the goals of retirement was to find my joy in creating again. So what would that look like? More/better storage, a cutting table, freshening things up and slightly improved organization was the plan.

I have a huge cutting mat. It’s 70 x 48 and it’s 35 years old. It’s pretty worn. It will be hard to replace as I have not seen one that big in years. I saw an IKEA hack for a cutting table that looked amazing. My hub builds furniture for fun and hates IKEA, so I ordered up my own version of the IKEA Kallax hack table. My cutting mat is on the top which is perfectly sized to fit. The table is custom height for me. The cubbies are customized for storage bins and it’s on wheels. The best part is you can break it down into two cupboards if you don’t need the cutting part. It’s fantastic and I love it.

I wanted a sunny color. I wanted yellow: not too yellow to affect my color use but enough to augment daylight and be a happy color. I’m thrilled with my paint color. I put up some new shelves and my prayer flags. I acquired a bookcase from my retired husband that fit perfectly under the window. Last but not least, I played with various floor plan configurations of cutting table and machines. The fact that I sold my walking foot industrial made it much easier to squeeze four machine into the space. The table being on wheels is excellent.

What would complete the dream is a suite of industrial machines: a cover hemmer, a serger, and 5- or 6-thread flatlock.

Machines currently in use from L to R: Artisan needle feed, Babylock 644 serger, Elna 780 and a Brother 3550 coverhemmer.

Sometimes I am annoyed that I didn’t do this sooner, but as I’ve mentioned before I’d kind of lost my joy. Why would I be motivated to spruce it up when all I wanted was to close the door at the end of the day.