Repair, redo, rest. Repeat.

I'm in the final stretch of a forced basement remodel. We had a small slow leaking flood in the laundry room which left us with black mold and a task: Redo the basement how we have always wanted it, but never got around to because there was no emergency. Completely DIY, so it has taken months longer than I would have liked, but girl, has this girl got skills! I can hang dry wall, mud, put in molding, caulk, hang cabinets, tile and grout...and paint - of course, I already knew how to do that, but practice does make perfect! I bought a new angled brush that really cuts well and I found that I can trust my hand a little more on the edges with it, although I still taped quite a bit. Heck, I'm a regular jack of all trades these days.

So, my studio is there, in the basement... It was cluttered and dark and lacking in all things that inspire. Now, I've got bright can lights, bright tile floors and an empty room to fill up again. I'm not putting everything back, which will certainly cause another remodel somewhere else in our home, but for now, I need to create the perfect studio out of this small 12'6" x 12'6" room.

In progress, back recovering from tiling.

Little by little, things got done and now, after all these months, it has shaped up, into something for which I've been waiting many years; a creative and happy space to work and be inspired. I'm ready for re-entry. I can't wait to sit down at my desk and feel energized again with that verve! (Actually, I'm doing that now, writing this post.)

Today, the rug I've waited two weeks for arrived and the installation is complete. A studio that is brighter, finished, cleaner, neater, and full of less stuff. (Lots of stuff, but less stuff.)

Here's a pic with the rug down, which is my final large addition to the space. It has lots of fun colors to keep me happy and pulls the yellow walls and the red and gold chair together. It was cheap enough I don't care if it gets an occasional paint mess on it, and it's washable, too, which is good because there are two to three canine companions hanging out with me on any given day. So, voila....my new space!

After; the finished studio, all ready to get back to work!

I used to say, "I'm going to the dungeon!" when I was headed off to work. That was when the basement still had concrete floors and a $20 gray throw mat on them, with a window that had no trim molding and raw wood, baseboards that were never installed and plenty of little cracks which invited in the spiders. More than that, I had no place elsewhere in the house to put all my stuff, so I resorted to buying more and more bookcases and shelving units until the perimeter was completely stuffed with, stuff.  My husband, when he saw the sheer volume of my displaced stuff (all of it necessary-that's what an art supply hoarder says), exclaimed, "You never had a studio, you were just painting in a storage room!"  Truth. Pfffllbbttt.

Before; a terrible cluttered, dark and complicated place.

By the way, the guest bedroom is now the storage room, so if you want to stay over, you may have to climb on the bed to get around it. In fact, I haven't opened the bed yet to see. Hope that works out. Well, I'm off to buy gutters, which will be used for leaning art. More pics and panoramas in the next post!

Have a nice day,
Rebecca

Repair, redo, rest. Repeat.