Studio Makeover: The Beginning of the Workroom

This weekend we built our new work/paint/sanding room. When I say "we," I mean Sam and Jesus from Property Comfort Interiors built the room while Jerome and I painted. Sam is our landlord's nephew and has been a huge help as we've taken on various projects around the apartment. Thank God they had a free weekend to help us out and were able to get our room up in just seven hours!

BEFORE 

Jerome and I took care of painting while Sam and Jesus did the building.

All done!!! (try not to laugh at my drywall taping)

The green paint is going to extend over top of the workroom.

At 12' x 6', it's not the biggest room but it's just the size I need to work on furniture and store my tools. Unfortunately we couldn't add a ceiling due to fire codes; the room must have access to the sprinkler system in the rest of the studio and paying for sprinklers to be brought down and added was NOT in my budget. That means we'll have to come up with some clever ways to work around having an open ceiling, such as using more water-based products to deal with smell issues or using plastic tarps over the ceiling of the room when doing smelly/messy work.

My favorite part of the studio so far? Our new doors for the workroom! Instead of paying for boring standard doors, we decided to go vintage. I wanted something wood with glass panels so I can see outside of the room while I work. I searched craigslist but couldn't find what I wanted. Then as we were loading drywall into the freight elevator, we found FREE old doors on the loading dock. According to Sam, these doors would go for several hundred dollars if we tried to buy them. MAJOR SCORE!!!! They were just laying there waiting to go out to the trash. They even have the glass panes that I wanted. Talk about awesome! I'm currently in the process of stripping, sanding, and staining them dark walnut. I can't wait to see how gorgeous they look when they're hung on the workroom!

I'm also in the middle of taping the drywall. By myself. This could be bad! So far, most of my taping has gone well and there have only been two pieces that didn't turn out right but I'll get those fixed in no time. The final coat of joint compound goes on today and tomorrow I'll be able to start priming and painting. Sam will be back on Friday to install the doors and then the room will be finished. YEAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!