Building My Craft Room- The Ugly Bits

I’ve been building my craft paradise for the past 6 months. Urgh, Oh Em Ghee, did it really take that long?  The story goes like this… building a room from scratch takes a lot of time (period). I had a great team to help me; My main man master carpenter brother – Neil Shannon, my wickedly awesome hubby-Justin (whom some of you know as craft slave), and my awesome-possum neighbour friend (who seems to get roped into everything)-Darrel.  I could not have done it without their help, THANK YOU!!

Today’s post isn’t the gooey goodness you’re after, but I promise the reveal is coming.  I just wanted to show you what I started with before you see the beautiful room it is now. You may be asking yourself why did she need a new space, the last one was bigger than any girl would ever want?? We decide to invite an exchange student into our home, and he needed a bedroom. As code would have it (and common safety sense), a bedroom needs a window, the craft room was the only basement space with windows. I did have to forgo natural light and a some square footage, but I am so happy with my new space those things are faint memories!

The budget for this space was less than nothing.When you subtract the cost of drywall, fixtures, flooring, etc. (thankfully labor was free) there isn’t a whole lot left for prettiness. I managed to find all my paint in the mis-tints, found a desk at an army surplus store for $30, snagged a few things in my moms attic, picked up fabric, baskets, picture frames at thrift shops for next to nothing, and repurposed everything else.

The biggest snafu I ran into with this build was the lighting. Hubby put in loads of pot lights but they were close to the furnace vent, so when the blower turned on the lights went out because of the overheating safety (blah). Then I waited for LED lights to arrive (which took far too long, hence most of the delay in the reveal). Side note: anyone out there that does drywall for a living – kudos to you, this is the least fun, messy job I have ever done in my life.  I can’t wrap my head around why someone hasn’t invented a cleaner method of this yet! Don’t I look great in that mask?

My solid wood desk in much need of some TLC.

Old record player cabinet from Mom’s attic.

Glass-less big ugly picture frame, and 99¢ wood crates.

There you have it, the UGLY. Please come back to see the AFTER y’all!