My room is a blank slate....need your ideas!!
 

Help me create my new sewing room!!! My daughter and her two girls after seven years are finally moving to their own place and I will have two bedrooms and a bathroom back. Yippee!!!

One of the bedrooms is going to become my sewing room. It's 11x11 and basically a blank slate. I need some advice about your sewing rooms and what you have found to be the MOST valuable thing that you use to get and keep organized.

I have two 'lunch' tables I can use...one is 6' long and the other is massive...gotta be at least 8' feet...and pretty rough looking so not sure I want to use it. Also have a white cabinet that I found at Target. Nothing special. Also have a couple of plastic cabinets. I have 5 FW's, 4 black ones that are for my grandchildren. My white FW is used for piecing. A 1971 Kenmore 158, a Singer 301A, and a Singer 401A in a cabinet, but I'm trying to sell this one. Also a treadle cabinet, but no machine in it at the moment. This one will probably go in the foyer. Other than that I have nothing! Even planning to put down new flooring if the carpet doesn't clean up nicely.

Help...I need your input!! What set up has worked out best for you?

Thanks much, - Julie

Make sure the table you use for cutting is hip height to eliminate backaches!

Keep your fabric out of direct sunlight to prevent fading.

Try to incorporate a design wall of some kind.

It would be cool if you could display your FWs and other vintage machines on a shelf.

Here is what I have learned: You need at least one table for your sewing machine, one for a cutting table (I put the bed risers under my cutting table so it is tall enough), storage drawers for my sewing supplies, someplace close to your cutting table for your cutting supplies (I have a pegboard on the end of one of my shelving units & a shelf on the wall), fabric storage (I have 3 - shelving unit for large pieces - 1/2 yrd & larger, dresser drawers - fat quarters to 1/2 yard, & photo boxes - for cut pieces - I use Bonnie Hunt's scrap cutting method), a design wall (mine is portable but I'm trying to figure out how to get a permanent one). I have extra items in decorative display (buttons & misc supplies in jars, etc). I'm still organizing my studio but will have pictures soon.

I love my pegboard. I have one by my cutting table and one by my quilting machine. It's so much easier to stay organized when things have a place and having my rulers visable have been great.

Sounds like all is already been covered. But remember this is YOUR room, fix how it will work best for you. We have 2 hobby rooms and have rearranged them several times until they were best for us. Don't make it feel like a chore, have fun with it!... Enjoy your new room, can't wait to see the pics!
Country1

Go to the QB section "Mission organization" (which is where your thread is) and spend an hour just looking at the pictures and reading what others did. You have an encyclopedia of information at your fingertips!

There are so many idea here is this section have fun and enjoy!!!

Good lighting is imperative. Tartan is right, we usually don't use all the wall space in a sewing room. You could make one of the walls your design wall. That's what I did and it's worked out really well.

I had a thought about your 8 ft. table. You could have a piece of smooth plywood or laminate cut to fit a large portion of it, but, save a couple feet & make an ironing space out of it. You could use the other 6 ft. or so for cutting if it was put on risers. Just a thought. No matter how you set up your room, it will be great & it will be YOURS.!!!

Thank you everyone! I will take pics of my progress if anyone is interested.

I found a wood/laminate floor to be the best thing I did in my room!!! My room is only small (9'x7") so was reasonably cheap to do....but well worth it for ease of cleaning and finding dropped pins!! Like others have said...lots of brilliant ideas here....just enjoy making it YOUR space!!!:)

We found this great flooring at Home Depot that we plan to use when the time comes. It's a laminate that looks like grey driftwood. They have a lot of little samples there that you can take for comparison.

If you have access to Ikea, they have a great bookcase which is just perfect for displaying Featherweights. It is from the "Billy" collection, is 15-3/4" wide and 79-1/2 tall. I have six Featherweights displayed on mine and it doesn't take up much wall space. Enjoy your new room! Betty

treat yourself to a laminae floor! then check out craigslist for IKEA storage pieces...your room will come together

I would definitely recomment a smooth floor surface. We just recarpeted our multiple purpose room where I sew. It is hard to move my roll around chair and I am constantly finding pins in the carpet.

Keep everything portable for a while. Move things around until the room "feels" right. You know - yin/yang. If the room's not right the creative juices don't flow. Don't get in a hurry to have it finished. In this regard smaller pieces (the cheaper the better) work best as they can be rearranged and disposed of until you are happy. Just my 2cents worth.

I agree here. I had things set up very pretty and nicely, but hardly ever used the room. I am in the process of rearranging my space for the 3rd time - this time seems like its going to be the charm (at least for a while!)

Great ideas....My space will soon be underconstruction....My room is going to be 20 x 30....I really need it....My office is so crowded that I can barely sit down...Makes sewin a challange...

Don't forget good lighting. A good table for cutting fabric. Good storage for fabric.
Organization, organization, organization, is key. A place for everything, and everything in its place.
Avoid clutter so you spend your time sewing and not looking for supplies, rulers, etc.
Enjoy putting your room together. :)

Wow -- so many great ideas!!! I definitely want new to rip up the old carpet and put down laminate to match the rest of the house. We got out tax refund back today so we may be going to Lumber Liquidators this weekend to find some flooring bargains. Yippee!!!!!!!

put peg board behind the door from floor to ceiling I put rullers and stencils on it. great uses of space. DH put small blocks of wood behind the peg board to keep it away from wall so the hooks will go in. shelves down from the ceiling makes good places for collections and things don't use very often.

I am putting this out there for your information.

Note: http://www.speedpress.com/products/2/1

For your cutting table you can purchase a Rhino Self Healing cutting mat with grid sheets included
and also along with various other sizes from 4' x 2' to 4' x 16' or 5' x 8' to 5' x12' or 6' x 12'

This is from a sign outlet, and we used to purchase all our mylar cutting mats for the draftsmen of our
engineering department, and they will also provide for your home sewing/quilting purposes.

Definitely gotta have a peg board for everything! Mine I painted quilt blocks on for added color. Here is the link to my room with a pic of the painted pegboard. http://www.quiltingboard.com/picture...d-t132914.html
I like it near by so I can reach it easy to get what I need and then put it right back when I'm done. Helps the cleanup.

I too have rearranged my room as I cut a hole in the big brown desk to have my machine level with the desktop. SOOO much better. I also now have the cutting area to my left, the machine in the center and my ironing station to my right so it makes it easy to swivel back and forth to each work station. OH YES! You gotta have a swivel chair!!!

Have fun is the main thing! I did my room All by myself including the flooring!

At one time I was in a 11' square and my DH converted the closet to store my fabric. He put shelves on one side and left the hanging bar on the other so I could hang tops waiting to be quilted. It was real nice. This pic was taken as was getting it organized.[ATTACH=CONFIG]398779[/ATTACH]

Great information Donna Jean...thank-you for sharing-that is definitely going to the save folder for future reference.

Can I be totally jealous here??? I am going from a 13x15 sewing room to a 10x12 room that I have to share with 2 twin beds and everything needs to be able to be put away when company comes. ACK!! I will be trying to figure that all out in April or May.. Next week everything will be moved to a storage unit.

I love the self-healing cutting mat with grids. The table I have that needs a new top is 3'x 8' so I can have it custom cut to fit. We may have to put a thin piece of luan or something on the table first to level out the divets and edges but a cutting mat that covers the whole table will be less expensive than buying 2 or 3 different large mats that could move and slip around. Pegboard behind the door is also a great use of space. I'm thinking of having a shelf put over the double window and to each side of the wall. That way I can display the Featherweights and also have rods that can hang quilts on each side of the window. Lots of fantastic ideas! Keep 'em coming. Having the carpets cleaned on Monday so if they look decent I might keep them. Still debating that one.

As for that 8 foot table, I would go buy a couple of new wood doors to attach to the top with L brackets. That gives you a nice smooth surface for working from and you could paint the table. I also made a pegboard turntable out of one 4x8 sheet of white pegboard. Had the guys at the lumber place slice it in 3 vertical pieces which I lashed together at the corners to make a triangle shaped tower. Then I made a small triangle of wood with casters to mount it to. Works great, only takes up 1foot of floor space and gives tons of storage. I would also install SMOOTH floor. I like the carpet because my feet stay warm, but I hate it for trying to keep clean and pins! If I could I would rip all of my carpet out and put some type of vinyl in. Then a throw rug or two if need be...

sewingroom
 

If I had it to do all over again, I would put kitchen drawer cabinets along one wall, the wide ones that have the smaller drawer on top, for my threads, tools, etc. Bigger drawers for fabric.

I would love to see a pic of your pegboard turntable. That is such a clever idea and I know my DH would get a kick out of making it. Thanks for the idea!

This is my cutting table with lots of storage. The cabinets are from Lowes or Home Depot. They're precut, need assembly. All we needed was screw driver, hammer and wood glue. Put the white side of the back piece out. The top is a prelaminate 2'x8' cut (the store does 1 cut for free) 3" longer than the cutting mat. The store also beveled the ends so the corners are not sharp. It's placed short side against the middle of sliding closet doors. This way I can cut from either side or the end and still get into either side of the closet. The cabinets are ~19" deep, giving a 5" overhang of the top. Peg boards could be attached to the back to store templates, etc. The cutting mat is OLFA gridded mat. It's 2 sections with clips to keep them in place. (I had a wider board, but even with my long arms it was uncomfortable to cut into the middle. To cut all the way across I had to walk around.) The height is standard kitchen counter height, perfect for me, too high for my 5' tall friends. [ATTACH=CONFIG]399048[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]399049[/ATTACH]

So many good ideas - I bought cupboards from Lowe's - one set with 3 drawers, one open with shelves and one with doors and shelves. Then brought over an antique cupboard to place on the top - it has glass doors and cup hooks (took a fork lift to get it close to the house. Wish I knew how to get pictures here - maybe someday I will figure it out!

My favorite is having an ironing area right next to my sewing machine. I have used an old computer table for my machine. To the left of it is a 4x2 foot table on which I have a 2x2 foot ironing board make from a tute by Jenny at Missouri Quilting Co. The other half of that table is next to the sewing machine so there is room for larger project to rest on. So when I am piecing I can just turn my chair and press...lost some of my exercise program but it flows so easy!!! LOL

My best advice is to find some used kitchen cabinets on Craigslist that are decent, and paint those. I used base cabinets on 2 ends and had open space between. My DH installed a 10' long countertop from Home Depot on that. Underneath, he built open shelves to hold the large totes, patterns, etc. I put velcro on the front and hang a curtain off that...the 'soft' side of the velcro is on the curtain. That way I can pull it off and wash it periodically, or take it off altogether if I need to re-organize, etc. Over this set up DH installed a set of wall cabinets at each end of the counter, and again, built open shelving in between. All was painted dove white, and I put my clear shoe boxes full of misc things on the open shelving. DH then took 1" x 5" boards and built a long skinny open shelf under the wall cabinets. There is tons of room for little storage cabinets, CD's, folded FQ's, etc. He installed a set of 3 Ikea mini flood lights that shine down on my countertop, so that's where I iron, cut, etc. I have a small ironing board (12" by 30") that I put up on my cutting matt when I need to iron, its quick and handy. The opposite wall is chock full of Ikea wall shelving, and the 2 end units have glass doors. The center cabinet is skinny (maybe 14" wide) which holds all my books. Between I have an antique crank table that holds my machines, and on the end under the window is my oversized chair & foot stool, to watch telly when hand sewing. It works, and other than the Ikea cabinets, most everything was here already, dirt cheap or free. Funny what a coat of white paint will do to unify everything!

Wow -- that sounds awesome! My room is only 11'x11' but I can definitely see doing something like this. Do you have pics you can share?

I was just reading in the "Pictures" section about a guy who is sewing in his basement. I love what he did to the top of his work areas! It would be a cheap and easy way to coordinate those work tables.
http://www.quiltingboard.com/picture...s-t215323.html

Also, if you can pick up a used dresser (or you might already have one) minus the mirror, they make excellent storage and are paintable. I used one from my mother-in-law's house and and put a board on top and covered it and made an ironing stations out of it.

1.My dad built a couple of floor to ceiling large standing type closets (no doors) with adjustable shelves where I store my fabric. These basically just look like skinny book shelves, and book shelves would work 2. Find old wooden boxes at thrift stores (or other places) to put fat quarters/fabric/rules/scissors etc. in. These are cheap and decorative. 3. I bought a shoe organizer that hangs on the back of a door and is designed to hold shoes on the right and the left of the organizer. It is perfect for holding fat quarters, bobbins, thread, scissors, all kinds of misc items and because it hangs on the door it doesn't take up much space. It also holds a lot of things. 4. Always have a garbage nearby, hanging off your table if possible to keep thread, pins, etc. off the floor and cleanup easier. If you can, have a garbage cut into your table where scraps can just be pushed into the "center hole". 5. Get an adjustable chair so that you can sit at different heights when sewing, ironing, cutting, reading, designing, etc. 6. Paint your room a color that you really love and will enjoy being in every day. Make sure it is warm in winter and can be cool in summer.

Again -- thanks for all the wonderful suggestions. We had the carpets cleaned yesterday and the sewing room carpet, which is builder's grade and 20 yrs old), didn't come as clean as I'd hoped so I convinced my DH that it's time to bite the bullet and laminate the floor in both spare bedrooms. Yeah! He is always trying to find ways to pinch pennies and even though I am a practical person by nature, these carpets are just not worth keeping any longer. He finally said, 'I've been thinking, this room really means a lot to you and you've waited a long time for it, so just buy what you want and we will make it happen. You deserve it.' How sweet!!!!

So the room is light green and the laminate is maple colored. We found an awesome deal on Craigslist for a 5' wide kitchen cabinet and white formica top for $50. It's got 3 drawers and shelves underneath. It's painted a milkpaint light green that compliments the walls perfectly. I also found an awesome sewing table set up to make for $112. So as soon as the laminate goes in we can start building the table. Pics to come.

Sounds wonderful! You'll love the laminate - its so nice being able to sweep up threads and pins, etc. What a great hubby - you are going to feel all refreshed and ready to sew!