bluwaterstyle craft room tour ~

This week is all about bluwaterstyle on the home front, starting with my very personal craft room tour. 🙂

We’ve finished up several big projects and I’m sharing them on the blog this week. {Total aside ~ is anything ever really complete? There are always a few items on the wish list.} Grab your fave beverage for the long post! Having worked on this space for so long, I decided it put it all out there in a single post, rather than chopping it up.

Oh and if you’re looking for some of my travel stories, try a couple of my favorite adventures here and here! And don’t forget the cocktails!

I’ve included links where I can for the furniture and other bits and pieces. This photo is an early morning peek, and there are lots more photos as the morning goes by, so here we go ~~~

Let’s get on with the craft room tour ~ and the IKEA cart that started it all. I ordered this 3-tier rolling cart the year IKEA introduced it in their catalog ~ 2011 or 2012. It has since become a best seller for IKEA, and started my slight obsession with their turquoise metal furniture collection.

On later IKEA visits, I picked up the turquoise metal printer cabinet ~ and the turquoise metal credenza with sliding mesh doors {on the right side wall in the photo, hidden by the craft table}. I also found the pair of brushed aluminum table mounted architect lamps at IKEA ~ FOR $8 EACH. YES, THAT’S RIGHT ~ $16 FOR THE PAIR! I’ve never seen them since, and they’re not on the website. I swear they were either mis-marked or a close-out, and I snatched them up in a heartbeat!

The table used to be a kitchen table for six, but is now a craft table for one. More on the chalk paint table re-do at the end of the post. I love that I can use the table with two different set-ups ~~~

The first set-up is on the flat tablet top. Craft paper on a curtain rod mounted under the table can be pulled up for painting, wrapping or to protect the table for other projects. This is a great option for doing paper crafts with my Cricut, which was a birthday gift from Bluwaterguy some years back. 🙂

The second set-up uses a portable drafting board I’ve had for nearly 20 years. It used to come in handy on top of my dining table for various projects, but now has a more permanent home. The drafting board with sliding parallel bar and cutting mat is great for all kinds of projects. The white leather rolling chair was a random CostCo find, and it replaced the original non-rolling chair from the kitchen set.

The storage armoire and wall organization system came courtesy of my sweet Aunt B. and Uncle F. who gift me with Christmas funds each year. I used my gift funds towards the armoire a couple of years ago, and this year their generosity funded the IKEA FINTORP wall system that had long been on my list. Oh, and I had enough left over to pick up the curtain rod from Target for the under table craft paper roll too!

The armoire is part of the Sauder Harbor View Collection and can be ordered from lots of retailers. Here’s the link to Amazon ~~~

The armoire and wall organization combo houses a LOT of stuff for all my random and eclectic projects ~ like this one, and this one, oh and this one! I didn’t particularly style things for these photos, just tidied up a bit, so this is the real stuff!

Here’s the turquoise metal credenza, or at least the top of it! We mounted a brushed metal gallery rail from Crate and Barrel over the credenza for my inspiration cork boards from The Container Store. And I love, love, love my reversed day hammock and evening hammock photos from Jasinski Brothers Photography. Perfect for my “Hammock Inspector” job, eh? 

That’s the bluwaterstyle craft room tour, and there are a few more details below. Come back later this week to see the rest of the renovation in this big room, and the furniture refresh that gave nearly 30 year pine shelving a whole new life. Thanks for stopping by and see y’all later!

 

 

To wrap up the tour, I wanted to share a few other favorite details with you.

This first group is all about personal inspiration ~~~

1 ~ Beach glass stones from my “prologue” Seaside sojourn last year 

2 ~ A saying that gets truer each year, gifted from a friend for a special birthday

3 ~ Port and starboard running lights from a friend’s boat ~ and though I frequently get confused on left vs right, I always get port vs starboard directions ~ go figure. And small jars of sand from various favorite beaches.

4 ~ A Key West mile marker zero from our Florida Keys road trip and picture of my favorite Islamorada beach.

A few favorite organization tricks ~~~

1 ~ The under-mounted curtain rod for paper to pull up and over the table top.

2 ~ A spot for silicone mats to manage random hot-glue project needs

3 ~ A metal mesh basket from Target to hold paper saved from shopping and wrapping to re-use for painting projects ~ and stowed under the printer table.

And a quick bit about the craft table re-do ~~~

1 ~ The pine top was in pretty good shape but didn’t fit in with the rest of the room or the craft space ~ and you can see the “turquoise dipped” legs I had already completed as part of this project.

2 ~ A quick bit of sanding to rough up the varnished surface before chalk painting ~ perhaps not necessary, but I prefer to do it

3 ~ A base coat of Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in Paris Gray, with Provence turquoise on the edge for distressing. I used the same Provence color for the “turquoise dipped” legs.

4 ~ A top coat that’s a 2:1 mix of ASCP French Linen and Paris Gray. I selected this three color/finish combo as I know this table top will continue to get beat up with use. I wanted a finish to tie in with the other pieces in the space and that would age well with wear. I added a coat of Miss Mustard Seed’s clear wax and then a coat of dark wax, and buffed to finish. You can see the finished table in the room photos above ~ and I think it all worked out! 🙂