I have a confession – I am addicted to reorganizing my quilt studio. I can’t help it; every year, I end up making changes. Some of the changes are good, some are … well, some changes aren’t good at all. But in my quest for a fully functional studio, I continue to organize, adding and subtracting things as I find what works and what doesn’t.

My reorganization attempts most often start when I go into my studio and I can’t find whatever it is I want/need/desire. I like to have a place for everything, and I want everything in its place. Call me fussy or old or whatever. I just do better when I can reach into a door, shelf or cabinet and find what I need. I hate to move things just to get to a sewing machine. I don’t like searching for tape measures. It drives me absolutely bonkers when I lose the book that has that cute quilt I really want to make.

WHY ISN’T EVERYTHING WHERE IT’S SUPPOSED TO BE AT ALL TIMES?!?

But I digress. My reality is that I have so much stuff, it’s practically impossible to organize it completely. I keep trying, and I spend a lot of time on YouTube watching videos on organizing a quilting studio or sewing room. I peruse blogs for tips and tricks on how to wrangle the clutter. I skim Pinterest looking for photos of well organized quilt studios. And after 15 or so years of meticulous research and studious attention, I have learned one truth about the ultimate organization of a creative space.

It cannot be done.

If there is one thing I have learned in the last several years of trying to find the “perfect” studio layout, it is that there is no such thing as a perfect studio layout. YouTubers will post videos at least annually about how much better their current incarnation of studio is than last year’s studio. Bloggers post beautiful photos of studios that are ready for photo shoots, but that I would find impossible to work in. Almost all of these studios have one thing in common – they aren’t all that functional. They are beautiful rooms, full of color and light and a bunch of fabric, patterns and other things. But what they lack is functionality.

I fell for the beautiful photos and the matching furniture with the all white themes (why is it always white?!). The beautifully painted walls of yellow, pink, purple, blue and green. Some rooms look like a cotton candy machine threw up right in the middle of them. Words adorn the walls and shelves: Create. Sew. Make.

I refuse to put words in my studio like that, just because they have become so common. I don’t need big block letters to tell me to Make anything. I can do that on my own.

When we first moved into this house 3.5 years ago, we were in the middle of the Holiday season. It was the week after Thanksgiving, and work was busier than a one armed wallpaper hanger. We both work in retail, so things just got thrown wherever we could find to put them, with a promise to work on getting it “right” after the busy season was over. Three and a half years later, and things still aren’t right in this house. But this year, I decided that by all I hold good and holy, things were going to get right, at least in my studio.

I began by making a plan, not for looks, but for functionality. I made a list of the things that I wanted in my studio – cutting table, sewing machines (of course), fabric storage, heat press. I got pretty detailed, right down to listing each sewing machine separately. Then I numbered the list based on priority of how important it was to have that item in my studio. Were there things that were “nice to have” in the studio but not “required to have”?

Once that was done, I looked around at the furniture at what I have that would work for my needs and what would not. I began moving furniture around in the room to decide where I wanted things, and what would work. It’s a good sized room, but it isn’t huge at 16′ x 11′. I decided that I could keep the cutting table, which is two IKEA dressers pushed back to back, the Kallax unit, a couple of elf baskets from the Container Store, and two of my three sewing tables. I could have kept all three sewing tables, but one of them really wouldn’t work well for my heat press, so I decided to remove it from the room.

I considered 18 different ways to get my heat press in the room. I really want to use it for sewing and quilting, and it would be so convenient to have it in the studio when I’m working on t-shirt quilts. I wasn’t sure where to put it, though. We talked about one end of the cutting table, a sewing table, the drawers that go with the sewing table, putting a top on a cart. None of that seemed right. Each idea was rejected.

I kept coming back to the Husky mobile workbench/tool chest. I had a stacking Craftsman chest many years ago that I used to house all of my sewing/quilting implements. Back then, it was a lot easier to get almost everything in there, because I had a lot less to store. I knew it would be a good fit for sewing items, but those tool chests are big, bulky, and I already had a ton of stuff in my studio. Why would I add yet another piece of furniture? I kept telling myself I didn’t need it.

A couple weeks ago, our front door glass shattered, and we’re in the process of replacing the door. While we were looking at doors at Home Depot, there were some Husky tool chests near where we were looking (after all, Father’s Day is just around the corner). I was looking at doors, but I was also checking out the white Husky tool chests. We didn’t buy anything, but the next day, I asked Chris if he could go with me to buy one. Once we got there, and we started looking at the white chests, we decided that they weren’t sturdy enough, and a little smaller than what I wanted.

Right next to the white chests were a few Army green tool chests that were a little larger, a lot sturdier, and $50 more. SOLD! I chose the one I wanted and we realized that the two of us wouldn’t be able to get it out of the truck alone, and everyone was working that could help us. So we paid for it and Home Depot held it until we could get back the next day to pick it up.

I’m just beginning to move things in to it, but I can tell you that this thing is a beast, and it’s going to hold a lot more than I thought it would. I’m still working to move things around, but I’ll keep y’all updated!