My Studio

My mess of a studio still waiting for the clean up fairy to come along ! Although usually on a Friday night I often have a big clean up so I give myself a big surprise on Tuesday morning because by then I have managed to forget I have had a clean up............strange but true.
I love the size I must admit although the bigger the studio the larger the potential to get into a serious mess. I have had this studio for six years and all my previous studios have been really small, so here I have room to spread out and to create and this studio has the most wonderful natural light. The view outside is of blond brick wall but I can see some blue sky if I take the time to look up through the buildings. My shop and studio, (you can see into the shop and from the shop into the studio) is in a Victorian house and the shop is in the front two rooms and hallway and my large studio is I guess in what was once two bedrooms at the back (as the walls have been removed it's a bit hard to imagine).
You can see my old sewing machine, straight sewer only - no ziz zag or reverse but will sew through your finger if you let it ! which is the only one I use as most of my millinery work is hand sewn so I only use a machine on the easily accessible parts of a hat and I also make things like the navy scarf/headband there on the mannequin (this is the one I handmade for a customer during Spring Racing Carnival - I was making her one in black silk but only discovered that is was not black but French navy at the last minute !!!) I was literally putting in the last stitch and the long tail of the scarf fell on my jumper - which was black - and this is when I discovered that they had sold me the wrong colour at the fabric store and I had in fact made a dark navy one!! So nothing else to do but head back to the fabric store for the correct colour - I should rely more on my instincts as I noted when I spread the fabric out on the cutting table to cut it, it did look like charcoal and not black and I thought to myself 'oh, that's a nice charcoal black...'...well, will double check next time but not the sort of thing you want to have happen when you are so flat out busy. I have a huge set of steel frame shelves (they cost a small fortune to have put in place and are they ugly!) this is where all the feathers , straws, felts and silk flowers are all kept in their separate colours.
This building is set between two big buildings and this little house looks a bit squashed in but I am so glad it is still here as I would hate to be in a modern concrete building (box). I also have a storage room and big kitchen and off street parking - perfect...all that's left is for me to get creating. That is my abandoned chair there as I have run off to the computer again !