If you've been reading my blog a while you'll know that my first creative spot was inside a closet and then I moved out into the family room.  Well after hearing my husband complain about so much "c**p" everywhere for the 10,000th time, we agreed that I would take over the spare bedroom (former nanny's bedroom, former office with said closet).  I knew I couldn't fit all my Ikea furniture in there so hubby has inherited 1 desk as a result.

This is the end result:

View from the doorway, you can see my art table immediately in front of you.

Once inside you see my magazine rack. 1st shelf = knitting, 2nd shelf = photoshop, 3rd shelf = scrapbooking. This shelf was picked up from Winner's a while back.

Jutting into the photo from the right side is my easel.  It's a french easel with 3 legs so it isn't the smallest thing in the world but I can't afford a floor easel right now so I'm making do. The only thing that is good about it, is that it does have a forward tilt - an essential for pastel artists so the dust falls to the floor and not all over the painting. To the right of the easel is my metal drawer unit (from Ikea) that stores art supplies not in my plein air bag, includes tubes of paint, all the left over pastel sticks (I only use 1/3 or 1/2 in Heilman pastel box), pencils etc. Garbage can is underneath on the floor.  Brushes are on top in a metal pot.
P.S. This is my latest work, it's a portrait of Eric Dolphy, a jazz bass clarinetist/saxophonist.

Next up is my computer workstation area.  I've moved back into the closet.  You can see my printer, laptop, 24" monitor and scanner.  I also have a rubbermaid drawer system under the desk for my stamping supplies.  Since this photo was taken I've added an additional shelf and bulletin board above the scanner.

Next up are my shelving units - cubes from Ikea.  I *love* these shelving units they are so versatile. I actually have 3 of them and used to keep them all upright, but this time I thought I'd turn one on it's side so I could use the top for additional storage. Baskets on top are journaling basket and unmounted stamp storage.  File folders are full of genealogy stuff to be sorted (on a backburner right now).


Immediately above these shelves is a window where I keep my camera collection, 4 vintage rangefinders and my grandfather's kodak.


Next you'll see my Ikea Alex drawers.  I love these because they are shallow and can hold large paper - 13x19 printer paper but they are not quite large enough to hold newsprint paper pads.  On top is my cutting station - an SU guillotine and a mat cutter.

Now for my art table.  This is also from Ikea.  The table can slope or be level and can be at various different heights. I try to keep it sloped to prevent me from piling too much on top of it! 

So that's it.  I hope you enjoyed the tour of Studio M, my creative playground :)