Garage turned into quilt studio

[Denise L.]

Thank you Judy. That was an unexpected result of me sending in those pictures. For some reason I kept all the patterns for that quilt. I'm thinking it would be something cute to do as a Mckenna Ryan style, do some block but not necessarily all of them. That is a pretty big quilt. When I designed the quilt I made one block too many - I guess my math was off a bit so I then put that one on the back. Why waste a good block!

I do love my room, and of course miss it during the day when I'm at work. My sons DGF comes over and uses it and she enjoys the ease of use. This morning it's a mess but I don't care, I'll work on some blocks and then pick it up tonight so it doesn't get "out of hand"

denise

[Judy M.]

Denise, I saw your studio tonight on the Stitchin' Heaven web site. It's so beautiful!!! I hope they do make your quilt into a BOM. Good luck!!! Judy in Torrance

[Eileen K.]

Denise,
I love your sewing room! How big is it? Do you sell your purses online? On Etsy?
eileenkny

[Eileen K.]

I'll take it!!!! I keep moving my sewing table around the house trying to find the perfect spot. I'm now in my 4th or 5th and DH is getting tired of moving the furniture. :?

Before moving furniture around, I measure all the pieces and cut them out of graph paper. Then I move them around on graph paper marked with the room size, window placement and size, closets, etc. Much better on the old back :lol:

Hope this helps someone!
Brita

Brita,
It did help. That's what I've done this time. Even have room for a real bookcase. Just have to move a little bit of stuff, all in the same room this time.
eileenkny

[Sue R.]

Denise,

Congrats on getting famous ! That's great you could show your space on the blog. Looks like a fun place to work and play !

Your Sweet Treats quilt is adorable. Are you on your way to your first published design, or have you done others ?

Sue

[Denise L.]

I saw that on facebook I wish I had a big sewing room when my kids have there own home I will have a big room just waiting is hard Happy

[Denise L.]

My sewing room has been featured in a blog from Stitchin Heaven in Quitman Texas.

It's very exciting since they may want to use my Sweet Treats as a Block of the Month. It's pretty cool.

denise

http://blogs.stitchinheaven.com/blog/

[karen f.]

Very Clever Anne! And so organized.
Karen

[Anne B.]

Anne, very nice storage system. I love all the colors in your stash too. What is your method of folding?

Thank you.

I fold my fabric in half lengthwise, then in half again, then I fan-fold it into nine-inch widths. I can count the folds on one side to see how much fabric I have. One fold is half a yard, two folds is a yard, etc.

I fold fat quarters and fat eighths the same way, except that I don't fold them lengthwise the second time. Scraps are in bins on the top shelves.

Since I live in Canada, I actually think in metres rather than in yards, but I had a little miscommunication with my cabinetmaker. I wanted my shelves 20 inches wide, so I could fold my fabric into 9.5-inch folds and place two stacks of fabric on each shelf. This would allow me to count the folds to see how many metres I had. I therefore told Rick I wanted the shelves exactly 20 inches apart. Didn't realize I'd misspoken--I should have asked for them exactly 20.75 inches apart. I hadn't taken into account the width of the vertical dividers! :/ So I fold into quarter-yards instead of quarter-metres.

I really find that it helps to sort my fabrics by colour, with the darks on the left and the lights on the right side of each shelf.

Anne

[Denise L.]

Anne, very nice storage system. I love all the colors in your stash too. What is your method of folding?

[Denise L.]

Anne: I love your gridded cover. May have to look into that.

The link I posted for the rails, has different weight grade rails, but your right the bottom rail would be needed for the heavy door.

Love your kitties too. Mine follow me into the studio and find the most fluffy fleece to nap on.

denise

[Anne B.]

Margo:

This is blue rigid insulation we bought at the Lowe’s.

Similar to what you see here:

http://www.homeconstructionimproveme...on-300x225.jpg

We glued the pieces together to make the wall the perfect size using caulking. My DH bent some metal to go on the top and bottom to hold it together for the 24 hours drying time. I had some batting that I covered the foam with on the non-printed side because otherwise the print would show through. I was going to just leave it propped up against a wall and under one of my quilts when not in use then my DH decided a rolling system would be better and hide some of my – at the time – cluttered stash. He made it neat and tidy for me – hence the pictures. Creative people don’t have time to be tidy. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

The rolling unit is using 2 pocket door frames butted together and screwed into the ceiling. The rolling casters are put into the frame and the other part is screwed into the top of the wall and that metal frame. Believe it or not the batting was pretty difficult to screw through! – again a perfect fit for that space with about 1 inch on either side of the rail to spare. The pocket door unit comes with the wooden frame around it. We did not need that nor did we need the stoppers at each end because it has such a perfect fit. This too was bought at Lowe’s. We have left over rolling units since we only needed 1 set for the wall and we had 2 rails. Now we’ll purchase just the rails from the manufacturer to make the 2nd unit. Rails are manufactured by:

As you can see by the picture, my foam wall sits below the rail.

http://www.johnsonhardware.com/2610f.htm


We do have enough room to put up another wall and rail in front of this one so I can have more design space and hide both sides of the shelves – left and right.

One thing is that we needed to assemble the unit IN the room as it would not have fit through the door once put together. He pre-cut everything at his shop (he has a sign business) and then we assembled it on that table in my sewing room.

This room is really 2 rooms that we combined into one. Where the design wall is - was my mother’s bedroom. She was a very tidy person and I’m sure is loving the fact that he cleaned it up and made my sewing space. That may be why things went together so easily, he had a little help from my angel mom! :wink:

denise

Denise, I have a similar system for my design wall, except that I didn't do it myself. I had a cabinetmaker build it. (There are pics in my profile, if anyone is interested.)

He used very heavy-duty (commercial-grade) tracks at the top and bottom, because the doors are solid oak with donacona board on them and then flannel covering the donacona. My doors would have been too heavy for the kind of track you have.

The message is that you need to consider the weight of your doors when choosing a track system to carry them.

Anne in Vancouver, Canada

[Margo C.]

Finally cleaned, organized and hung the design wall in my studio.

Here is a link to my pictures

http://community.webshots.com/album/570754402rVUNGz

denise

Love it, great use of your space. With such a big wall it's nice to be able to keep an eye on the progress of your quilts. I really like the grandma's garden quilt hanging on the wall.

[Margo C.]

Thanks so much for all the info, Denise! I'll look into that rail system! Lucky you to have an angel mom guiding a handy hubby!!
Enjoy your space....I'm sure your mom is smilin'!

[Denise L.]

Margo:

This is blue rigid insulation we bought at the Lowe’s.

Similar to what you see here:

http://www.homeconstructionimproveme...on-300x225.jpg

We glued the pieces together to make the wall the perfect size using caulking. My DH bent some metal to go on the top and bottom to hold it together for the 24 hours drying time. I had some batting that I covered the foam with on the non-printed side because otherwise the print would show through. I was going to just leave it propped up against a wall and under one of my quilts when not in use then my DH decided a rolling system would be better and hide some of my – at the time – cluttered stash. He made it neat and tidy for me – hence the pictures. Creative people don’t have time to be tidy. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

The rolling unit is using 2 pocket door frames butted together and screwed into the ceiling. The rolling casters are put into the frame and the other part is screwed into the top of the wall and that metal frame. Believe it or not the batting was pretty difficult to screw through! – again a perfect fit for that space with about 1 inch on either side of the rail to spare. The pocket door unit comes with the wooden frame around it. We did not need that nor did we need the stoppers at each end because it has such a perfect fit. This too was bought at Lowe’s. We have left over rolling units since we only needed 1 set for the wall and we had 2 rails. Now we’ll purchase just the rails from the manufacturer to make the 2nd unit. Rails are manufactured by:

As you can see by the picture, my foam wall sits below the rail.

http://www.johnsonhardware.com/2610f.htm


We do have enough room to put up another wall and rail in front of this one so I can have more design space and hide both sides of the shelves – left and right.

One thing is that we needed to assemble the unit IN the room as it would not have fit through the door once put together. He pre-cut everything at his shop (he has a sign business) and then we assembled it on that table in my sewing room.

This room is really 2 rooms that we combined into one. Where the design wall is - was my mother’s bedroom. She was a very tidy person and I’m sure is loving the fact that he cleaned it up and made my sewing space. That may be why things went together so easily, he had a little help from my angel mom! :wink:

denise