My New Studio

This is a crossover post with my homestead blog (here), where I've been documenting how we remodeled this room (starting with this) to create my fiber and textile studio. So over there, it signifies the completion of a project. Here, it's heralding a new beginning for me, as I make my return to the fiber and textile arts. I also want to share more details here; photographs that might not interest everyone; details like books, stash, equipment, tools, and all my little treasures. I can't say for sure these will interest anyone, but I know when I look at others' photos, I'm always curious about the details in the background. Snoopy? Perhaps! But also, I'm looking for good ideas. Most of the photos can be enlarged by clicking on them.

My studio is actually part of a larger room (originally called the sun room), which doubles in function as an office. For years this room was used for storage, as we slowly upgraded and remodeled our 100-year-old house. To define my area I created an entryway with two shelving units. They face outward so I can utilize as much of the window and wall space as possible.  

All of my cotton weaving yarns are on the left-hand bookshelf, books on the right.

I managed to get all of my plain cotton yarns on the shelves, plus a few blends. 

Everything is pretty much organized by yarn size.

I could use a few more shelves, I think. 

All other yarns are in drawers or totes: wools, rayons, rug-weight cottons, textured yarns (slubs, boucles, etc), and my handspun yarns. 

Next are the bookshelves on the right. I haven't bought a new weaving, spinning, dyeing, or knitting book in years, so I'm open to recommendations. Most of my books were hand-me-downs when I bought my looms, or from library and guild fundraising sales. If you click the bookshelf pics, you should get larger versions.

Weaving books. I have a lot of monographs and spiral bound books.

More weaving plus spinning and dyeing books, plus a few old copies of Spin-Off.

Knitting books. I didn't remember having so many books on knitting socks!
Most of my knitting books were overstock bargains I found at Edward Hamilton.

Workshop notes and samples, plus collections of patterns.

Behind the yarn shelves is my worktable. It's multi-functional for planning projects, cutting fabric, or sewing.

Set up with my electric sewing machine.

It's also where I put my table loom for weaving. 

View looking the other way.

The workshop light is wonderful. It gives me plenty of light in the late evenings, which is when I do most of my weaving or sewing. At the end of the table I found room for my button box.

Button & bead box, current weaving yarns,
and photos of the covers of my first two books.

The drawers under the table are handy for weaving and sewing machine accessories. In the taller set of drawers:

Top drawer contains sewing items

Next drawer, weaving bobbins

Aids for warp and warping

Bottom drawer contains items for sewing machine maintenance

In and on the shorter drawer unit:

My tablet weaving stuff resides on top of the shorter
drawer unit. One-off yarns are stored in the top drawer.

Bottom drawer: linen blend yarns, silk blend yarns, and slippery yarns.

Moving on.

 My sewing and reading corner. The basket on the
 floor holds my boro & sashiko inspired barn jacket.

On the wall:

A counted cross stitch I made in 1995.

A birthday gift stitched by my stepmother.

A Christmas gift from my daughter-in-law

You can read about my treadle sewing machine here, 

The hand thrown pottery bowl is for snipped thread
and you can see the contents of my sewing box here.

In the other corner is my Kromski Minstrel spinning wheel.

On the walls:

I'm not sure where this came from; I just like it!

For some reason I liked the card and so cross stitched the border.

A Christmas gift from my son and daughter-in-law.

On the closet door:

Little vintage pillow from my mother.

Inside the closet:

Stacked with totes of yarns and spinning fibers. It's a good
place for the ironing board, iron, and fabric cutting board.

You may be wondering how I managed to collect so much yarn. Some of it I bought online, some came from retiring weavers or guild sales. I got most of it, however, because my weaving teacher knew a man who owned a commercial spinning factory. She convinced him to selling odd lots to weavers. Several times a year they'd have a huge warehouse sale and offer two to five pound cones of run remnants, leftovers, dye test lots, incorrect or inconsistent dye colors, discontinued yarns, rejects, returns, etc. It was all priced at a couple of dollars per cone, so I bought a lot!

The remaining wall space is lined with shelving units, a filing cabinet, and a tall stack of totes.

The cabinet on the left has nice deep shelves:

 

The totes contain knitting yarn and dyed roving.
The basket on the top shelf holds embroidery thread,
and the brown cloth tote holds 2# cones of sewing thread.

Spool box inherited from my great-grandmother (a quilter).
The basket and box on top hold more sewing thread.

Shelf 3: handspun yarn in the totes, my lazy kate, and
electric sewing machine. The notebook is for tablet weaving.

Drum carder and bobbin winder, both with broken drive bands!

Bottom shelf: tote of acrylic knitting yarns and my ball winder.

So far, the filing cabinet only has two drawers of related items.

On top, is a basket of synthetic rug warp, given
to me when I bought my Schacht Mighty Wolf.

One drawer contains folders of workshop handouts.
I'm amazed that I actually kept all this organized.

Another drawer is filled with sewing patterns. I still
need to go through these as I have no idea what still fits.

This storage unit is an old analog TV cabinet. I almost got rid of it when we finally bought a flat screen TV, but it's oak and I thought it looked useful for something. It works well for storage, don't you think?

Repurposed analog TV cabinet. The plastic totes
hold more spinning fibers and handspun yarns.

I already had the plastic drawer units and was happy they fit perfectly. The baskets below them were a find from Dollar General. It's like they were made for the VCR cubbies. 

On top:

The plastic totes contain more yarn and fibers. My yarn swift is
lying next to them, and the fabric tote is my mending basket.

In the plastic drawers:

Spinning equipment

Weaving equipment

Dyes and mordants

Greeting card supplies

In the basket drawers:

Knitting needles and crochet hooks. My DPN roll is on the right.
I need to make one each for my crochet hooks and circular needles.

Sewing notions are in the other basket.

Below:

Sewing fabrics

There are still things I haven't managed to find room for: my large floor loom, my tri-loom, my Ashford Traditional spinning wheel, half-a-dozen boxes of spinning fibers, and a wooden trunk filled with my handwoven samples and fabrics. They will still have to take up space elsewhere.

Anyway, that was a lot of pictures! Hopefully, I haven't bored you, but it is good for me to have a photo record of where everything is. I will have to make sure it stays organized. 😉

My New Studio © August 2023

 by Leigh at Leigh's Fiber Journal

Related posts:

New Studio: Sneak Peek!

Studio Progress