My Sewing Space

When Steve got married I finally felt justified in taking over his bedroom permanently. I wanted to turn it into a dressing/sewing/craft room, but being as it was the smallest bedroom at 9' x 10' there wouldn't be room for everything I wanted to do. Because it is now essentially a large walk-in closet, I don't have room for a cutting table, or a soaping table, or much else for that matter. The more I thought about it I knew that even a dedicated sewing machine table would just end up getting burried with other stuff and be a major pain to be able to do a quick mending project. I wanted something where I could leave the machine set up for a quick fix but not be in the way. Then I realized the closet was no longer being used for clothes because I made the wall my clothes storage area. So instead I made my sewing space inside the bedroom closet.

I bought a 4' length of countertop and installed it inside the closet. I made sure I could fit a couple of rolling storage bins underneath. I can pull them out of the way to use the machines side-by-side when needed. I added some cubicles above for more storage ('cause a girl can never have too much storage!). There's a flurescent light attached to the bottom of the shelf which keeps the workspace nice and bright. It is working out surprisingly well. If I'm in the middle of an ongoing project I can just close the doors on it. I still don't have room for a dedicated cutting table so I'm still doing that at the modified kitchen table.

I've also recently added Gertrude to the mix. We're still getting to know each other. I'm not sure how well she is going to work out for me as I'm right on the border between the two sizes of dress forms. I went with the bigger one and have her as small as I can make her in order to be my measurements, but I recently read a thread on Sewing Pattern Review that talked about making dress forms a bit smaller than your actual measurements for best results. That's not going to be an option for me unless I eat lots over the holidays. Hmmmm...

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