I’d love to tell you that my home is perfectly tidy and organized all the time. The truth is that my house is a small flat that starts look messy if there is just one dish on the sink. I watched that Universe doco with Brian Cox and when he explained the second law of thermodynamics, something clicked. My house is in constant state of entropy….
entropy /ˈɛntrəpiLack of order or predictability; gradual decline into disorder
Every so often I overhaul a cupboard or a room, decluttering and tidying but over time it turns to chaos. I shared my last ‘back room makeover‘ with you. Back then it was a storage space with room for Mr Asks tools, instruments, technology and endless lengths of tangley cords. Over time the ‘back room’ became the ‘Sewing Room’. Which became sewing chaos! The room is a tiny 3m x 2.4m and there is a built in wardrobe that bites into that floor space. It’s so tiny I often call it my sewing closet. There’s just enough room for me and a cat or two. This make over is also an exercise in small space living!
Before I could make anything over, I had to declutter! I posted about my clean out in my destash post. Basically, I threw out the junk and sold lots of fabric off at the ASG Fringe Event. But let’s get to my sewing space!
Thread, Mirror & Rulers
Vertical space is super important when floor or surface space is limited! I mounted this thread board to the wall inside the door. It keeps all my coloured thread tidy and I think it looks pretty cute too. My machine uses inexpensive plastic bobbins, so I keep a bobbin for each thread colour. I slide the bobbin onto the dowel of the thread board before putting the spool of thread on top. I love that it makes it easy to get sewing if you have used the thread before. Even thought the spool is on top of the bobbin, they seem secure and I rarely knock one off. As you can see, I also use a skirt hanger to hold pattern drafts and I hook it off the bottom.
Mr Ask kindly hung the mirror for me, it’s just a cheapy from Kmart. I love having it there for trying things on for fit. I keep my dress form, Cece, nearby so that I can use the mirror when fitting on her. It’s so handy to see the back darts and how they’re sitting when I’m pinning the front ones.
I use a simple 3M sticky hook to hold my collection of rulers. I love to have a specific spot for things! I’m so much more likely to put things away where they belong when there is a specific spot for them.
File Cabinet, Bookcase & Fabric Rolls
Sadly, the whole room can’t be ALL sewing. Both the bookcase & the file cabinet serve their intended purposes. That said, a drawer in the cabinet and a section of the bookcase hold sewing patterns. Tune in tomorrow for my pattern filing system and how I do things. The overlocker lives on top of the file cabinet. It’s a good height for lifting it’s weight.
Sometimes when I buy more than 10 yards/metres of something, I get the whole roll too! As I will tell you tomorrow, I like to trace my patterns onto vilene/pattern trace & draft on ikea paper rolls designed for children’s artworks. My solution is less than elegant but functional. I bought a flip lid bin for $9, left the lid at the store (they love that, bin lids break much more easily than the body), found a discarded brick and wrapped in a plastic bag before dropping it in the bottom of the bin! Hey, whatever works right?
Racks, Boxes & Scissors
These racks are from Ikea and were pretty inexpensive. They are fabulously functional and don’t look awful. I love that they are quite high, taking advantage of that vertical space. I’ve filled them with fabric and that makes me happy!
Mummy Ask helped with my destash and finding a solution to fabric storage. We measured each piece of fabric, folded & rolled it, secured each end of the bundle with a rubber band and labelled it. Be sure to measure the boxes before this step, that way you can ensure things will fit. I used manilla labels from Officeworks. I put the length of the fabric and details about it (washed, vintage with some fade/holes be careful, used in x project) on to the label and then tied the label to one of the rubber bands. I divided the fabric into boxes marked with a category such as ‘wovens under 1m’, ‘lingerie fabrics’, ‘home dec’, ‘silk’, ‘sweater knits’.
This is the best solution I’ve found if you store longer lengths of fabric, the boxes keep out dust, light and cats (mostly naughty, naughty fabric pulling out for a little nap cats). The fact that they are bundled stops you from accidentally unfolding half the box while you rummage plus the label lets you know if you have enough for your project. I found having a variety of rubber band sizes means you can secure the bundles without creating undue creases. What I’ve found is that this method of storage keeps things crease free apart from the ones (centre) you want.
My scissor rack is just some Allen keys pushed through holes in the racks – ghetto storage at it’s finest! I wrapped some gaffa tape around the back side of the Allen key to stop it falling out, gravity does the rest. I love that when I’m sewing at my table, I can just reach back and grab, there are always scissors at the ready!
Sewing Table/Cupboard
I bought this Arrow cupboard on eBay for a fraction of the cost of many similar tables. It folds up to a neat boxy cupboard the size of a large bedside table. The part of the table that holds the sewing machine has an airlift system, so when it’s closed, the machine is inside. I leave it open most of the time but it’s great to be able up fold it up if we need a space or to access the wardrobe it sits in front of. I keep my black, white and navy thread on it’s inbuilt thread board, easy access and all. I store good but used needles in tiny snap locks, I cut a little hole in the corner so I can hang those on the thread board too. I keep a little tub of my most used items and ongoing projects on the bench. That little bin is my thread bin and it really helps to keep things tidy.
All The Little Things
I keep all my notions and bits and bobs on the back of the door, I wrote a post about it if you are interested. My only exception is the box of elastics and stretch laces I keep on the floor in front of the file cabinet. My aims with storage are; cat proofing and then tidiness. The cats leave these alone (I think the cards of elastic are uncomfy) and I ran out of space. I get a certain kind of joy out of the pretty rainbow and I’ve accepted they my house will never look like a Vogue Living shoot!
I also took the shade off the light in the ceiling. Bare bulbs are in right? I replaced the normal globe with a daylight globe from Daylight Man. If you’re wondering why, it’s that daylight globe show the spectrum of light you would expect from, well, daylight. It makes sewing such a pleasure when you can see! Black on black is so much easier. If you’ve thread matched in store, then come home to find it’s more off than you thought, you’ll appreciate what proper lighting can do! I came up with this solution after finding out the price of an OTT light. This is my dupe. It’s certainly enough in my small room, if you are blessed with more space, try both and overhead light and task lamp with this globe.
I may have mentioned that my cats see my sewing room as a personal soft things and fabric sleepy spot (not to mention what they do with a thread filled bobbin to play with), to help guide them away from precious stash but keep them involved in my sewing space, I put a cat bed underneath my sewing table. They always curl up (or create havoc) with me while I sew and so far they are happy with their hidden nap spot.
Well, this has been a longer than expected post! I am ever so well versed in making a small space work for multiple uses, in fact I had a series planned but I couldn’t wait to share. I feel like I read the whole Internet looking for ways to make my space work. Something that I found particularly hard to find was ways to store longer (3m plus) lengths of fabric. Pinterest tantalized me with things my space would never allow. This is what worked for me. No matter what size space you have, I hope that you are fired up and ready to sort it out! If you love your sewing space or you want to change it, I’d love to see pics! Everyone has that voyeuristic enjoyment about seeing into someone else’s home. We want to be thrilled by the perfection, sit in approval or disapproval of decor and we are vindicated when we see mess, filth or disarray. So, when I tell you I want to see your space, I totally mean it! I have a more detailed post coming tomorrow (it’s right here if you’d like to see it) about the things make my sewing easier and it covers pattern storage etc. Stay tuned in for that, it will be fun!
3 Comments
That was fun peeking into your sewing space.
I’m still waiting for my things to come, so I can let them break free from the boxes and create a satisfying chaos in my work room!
[…] fabrics will turn into wonderful garments! I promise you a post on how I end up storing my fabrics (Psst! You can check that post out now) when I get there but if I’ve inspired you to destash too and you can’t wait – […]
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