The most important project to get underway urgently after my move was sorting out a studio space for my handmade jewellery business. With the main bedroom, guest bedroom and office inside, there simply isn’t enough room for my studio in the house, so the plan was to sort out a very dark and very basic shed at the side of the house.
This galvanised metal shed had no back wall and just a single very small and grimey window. It was like a cave! Not suitable at all for me to work in, but it was a starting point.
Since then I’ve had family and tradespeople working very hard to help me transform it into a functional working space. It’s not completed yet, but I thought I’d share where it’s up to.
First of all a back wall for the shed was constructed and put into place – having four walls instead of three seemed fairly important! To the right is the back wall some time later with insulation in place and part of the plasterboard for the internal walls, along with an air conditioner donated by a family member (how civilised!).
Another key moment was seeing the windows in place! The four windows the studio now has were sourced from a salvage yard, so they’re all different.
As you can see, the front window (well, I think of it as ‘front’, but it actually looks over the back yard) is at ground level on the outside due to the slope of the property. My bench will sit in front of this window so I’ll be able to look up and (when I sort the garden out!) see lots of nice plants, greenery and a big tree.
And here is where the studio is up to right now – with my bench and a few tools in place as I had some urgent making work to do this week. Today an electrician is here putting in powerpoints and lighting so shortly it will be further along than this!
For reference, this is how the space looked before we started work (taken from the end of the studio with no wall):
Next step is that I need to get stuck into lots of sanding, re-plastering, more sanding, etc.. Once a few more details are sorted out I can then get on with painting. The walls will be plain white and the exposed metal beams will be a bright glossy red. I’m also hoping to find some vinyl flooring to go in and will get some bench and shelving space put in around the walls. Plus there’s a sink and tap to go in and I’ll have running water in my studio at last!
I’ll share some more photographs once it’s nearer to completion, which I hope will be very soon (as I’m very keen to get back to working properly!).
My studio window looks out onto the driveway of my house, which isn’t terribly exciting. 
