Sewing Room Do It The Right Way

Sewing room, work room, craft room, studio. So many different ways to address the room or space where we do our fiber arts! Is it pompous of me to call mine a Studio? Whether it's for machine embroidery or the interest of making quilts, I belong to a few online groups dedicated to various forms of stitching. These groups almost always have a section of pictures of the member's craft spaces. And the name of the space has always fascinated me. Sewing Room titles usually include a room with comfortable couches or chairs to do casual hand-stitching, lots of decorative items and extras like TVs and stereos. The purpose of these rooms seems to be to just indulge in a love of sewing in a pretty environment. Very pleasant. Work Room titles usually include industrial size embroidery machines, huge rolls of stabilizer and entire walls of thread. The purpose of these rooms is to create stunning embroidery of all types and always include a computer system. Very efficient. Craft Room titles usually include a station for scrapbooking, an area for paper and ribbon, and lots of glue. While sewing may or may not be one of the main interests in this room, they also have the look and feel of the comfortable sewing room, and the attitude of extreme busy-ness ... the crafter, not the room! Very colorful. Studio titles seem to encompass a bit of the other three examples. Decorative items and TVs provide visual stimulation that is not thread or fabric. Embroidery supplies (and others) are visibly stored on walls. Stations are set up for various areas of interest of the artist. Computers, large machines, and lots of lighting are key. What's missing are the casual, comfortable chairs and leisure extras. Studios proclaim that this is a workroom, not a casual hang-out. When setting up my previous sewing spaces, my main concern was making quilts. My rooms were small so, by necessity, only my work items could go into the room. I do always have a TV mounted up on the wall, though! Most of the walls were kept bare in order to leave space for a new thread rack whenever one was needed or to tape up instructions for easy viewing. My current space started out as a casual sewing room, including a twin bed for any guests. My main concern was proper areas for my machine embroidery tasks. Over the past few months, the room has evolved to include areas for fashion sewing, including my dressmaker dummy, quilting, storage for my fabric dyeing supplies, and an area for non-sewing crafts like painting, paper folding, and photography of my quilt blocks for instruction. As I put the room together, though, I realized that I wanted it to be pretty, too, and not just an efficient working space. I started out with wood shelving that I painted repeatedly to give a look of something old that had been re-purposed several times. The room began taking on a Tuscan look as I added curtains, plaques, and new chair covers for my old chair. Instead of my old wall-mounted TV, I now have a portable DVD player that I can move around as needed. I also have an extra chair so that my family can visit with me while I work. With all the decorative touches, this is the most comfortable of any of my sewing rooms, but it is most definitely meant for work! Still, I find myself reading at one of the work stations, working on my little netbook that is in there, and simply hanging out. So, I guess that no matter what I call it, that room is mine!