New Project: Built-In to Standalone desk

Remember when I posted last time about my family/crafting room? Guess what? It’s changed again! I’m starting to think that my favorite craft is rearranging my home.  I do more of that than any of my other crafts! My poor family has grown to not only get used to it, but expect it. These are the confessions of a serial rearranger/redecorator.

I must say, without having gone through those other rearranges, I never would have arrived at this perfect solution. With each move, I have added a new solution that opened up the possibilities for the next one. With this new arrangement, I actually stopped to think of how I want to use the space, instead of just trying to make it look like my inspiration photos. I love this current incarnation so much, I think it might actually stick. (The Mister rolls his eyes like ‘yeah right.’ )

Anywhoo, Here’s my recently rearranged living room turn craft room:

this side is my ‘everything fabric & textiles’ side. This is where my printing and sewing will take place.

doorway with milk glass collection.

here’s the other side for everything else, including my ‘office’ equipment.

Now that I look at it, I may put some legs on those storage units…

This latest rearrange came about as a result of me doing something I’ve wanted to do for a reeeaaallly long time.
See that 8foot long behemoth of a desk right here?

This used to be a built-in in my family room, complete with the lovely doo-doo brown peeling formica top. You can kind of see part of it here on the right hand side of this picture:

and here:

There were several problems with where it was located before.

1. It was very awkwardly positioned under a window and butted right up against the built in bookshelf. This made it hard to reach the window.

2. The sheer size of the desk and its location meant that the rest of the furniture in the  room was awkward to arrange because we had to leave so much walking space between the desk and the furniture. Combined with the massive fireplace on the other side of the room, that made for a really awkward arrangement.

3. The desk was meant to be a home office of sorts, but it was built circa 1970s before home computers and the millions of cords that come with them.  When we had a desk-top pc, all the cords ended up in a messy pile on-top of the table.  When we went to laptops for (almost) everyone, it dawned on me that this would be the perfect fabric printing/sewing table. The shelving underneath it perfectly stores my screens and other printing paraphernalia, while the drawers are perfect for scissors, needles and other sewing tools.

Where it was built in however, was not ideal. I would not have the room to maneuver around the table, which is important.

So, I spent last weekend pulling it out of the wall, yay me!  Did I mention that I sprained my wrist moving the behemoth from the old location to the new? Yes I did. Because I. am. impatient.  I did not wait for the Mister to get home from work before moving it myself. But I succeeded in moving it, with the help of my daughter! Can you say Girlpower!? Then I had to convince The Mister that yes, we have do have room for an 8 foot long table in the (very rarely used) front room. So my new (for the 4the time?) craft room is born!

Now that the table is all moved and all, there are quite a few projects in its wake. Like the part of the wall where it came from that needs to be patched and painted. Also the table needs to be finished.

To be done:

1. Sand down, finish or paint the top where I removed the formica. It’s amazing how easily 30 year old formica removes.

2. Put backing on the rest of the back where the desk used to be attached to the wall. For this I plan to put pegboard on the inside (for wrapping paper and big rolls of paper) and the same type of hard board (that is on one side of the table) on the outside back.

3. Prime and paint the whole thing. Maybe a juicy color? I dunno yet.

So, this is what I’ve been up to. Got suggestions? I’d love to hear them.