Features
We head to San Francisco to tour Chloe's bright and organized craft space.
"I moved here from New York where there is notoriously not enough room for anything, so I think my favorite thing about my space, is literally all of the space."
Tell us about your space?
My craft room and I are located in my home right outside of San Francisco, CA. I moved here from New York where there is notoriously not enough room for anything, so I think my favorite thing about my space, is literally all of the space. The space has no doors, and is kind of an open area between the houses kitchen and living room. I imagine it was, at some point, a dining room. But since my boyfriend and I usually eat at the coffee table or at In n Out, it seemed like an unnecessary use of the room. The room isn't shared with anyone, but whatever I'm listening to throughout the day, is a sound that is shared through out the entire house.
The room is large enough to do the following things in:
The room is large enough to do the following things in:
+build a fort
+inflate an rather large air mattress in
+sprawl out on the floor in, and draw or paint while laying on my belly
+ set up photo lights and a backdrop, for shooting
+build IKEA furniture in (extra cardboard pieces and all)
It is NOT quite large enough to to the following thing in:
+ a cartwheel
I'm lucky enough to have my work sometimes involve crafting, so yeah. I guess you could call it both. I spend most of my time in there editing photos, assembling construction papers, and making dolls.
What have you done to make your space cosy, beautiful or inspiring?
I started by replacing the original brown carpet with a white one and painted the room from a dingy yellowish white, to a ultra bright white! Changing up an environment really inspires me to keep changing and creating, and I LOVE bright white places. I feel like the color white can turn a room into a blank piece of paper, just waiting to be colored and drawn on!
I made one wall black and I keep only a few things there. Sometimes, having all of my pens and paints and colorful scraps surrounding me can be really exciting, but when life starts feeling overwhelming, so can my inspirational clutter. When I feel like that, it's nice to just turn my chair around and have a more minimal look come from the same room.
I also have about 10 different light sources in my room. Most of them are strings of light because, to me, they make a place feel lively or calming depending on how you look at them. I like having lively things around for inspiration so I love when Harvey the pup hangs out on my lap, when my boyfriend walks through the room, and I've also given all of my plants eyes and named every one of them "Gus".
How do you keep organized?
When I'm working on something, I usually form a mess and clean as much of it up at the end of the day, as I can. Even if what I'm working on isn't complete. Tucking fabrics back in drawers, taking photos off of my desktop and putting them into temporary folders, ect. Waking up to an organized room where I can find things, motivates me to keep it up. When I'm completely done with a project, is when I seriously fold up those fabrics and archive things onto the hard drive.
I also have started organizing my mind by writing out all of my daily/ weekly tasks on individual post-it notes and leaving them on the window in front of my desk. It feels so good to finish something, pluck that post it from the window, and have a better view of whats going on outside!
Any tips & tricks for organising supplies?
Instead of shopping around for office supplies, I like browsing through the kitchen section of places. I use bright cookie tins or cans with appealing packaging to store my pens and markers. If my eye is drawn to it, I find that I'm more likely to use whatever's in it, then if I were to tuck it away in a drawer.
I also keep a lot of things in travel bags. I turned one of my old hard shelled cosmetic cases into my camera storage. Fold up cosmetic cases with clear pouches are perfect for holding my little watercolor and gauche tubes.
For things that do end up going into drawers, I keep them from sliding around with the help of some paper plates and string! I made a tutorial for Whole Foods on how to make a fruit basket with these supplies, and have been using these little baskets to help separate little things in big drawers, instead!
Which are your favourite possessions and are there any of your own creations on display?
I don't keep anything in my room that I don't love having around but a couple of my favorite things are:
+My old radio that I adapted to be a speaker for my iPad tv
+Yoshimoto Nara clock that has a different Nara drawing flipping through every minute
+Twinkle lights that scale my black wall and make it look like outer space
+My Grandmas old passport photo. She's so elegant.
+My SD card reader, because I would be lost without it
I have things I've made scattered all though out my room. I think having your own work around helps remind you why you're unique. A couple of my favorite things of mine in the room are:
+A polaroid of Mickey Mouse that I took while I got to hang out with him on a Disney cruise
+The Gross Ghost mask that doubles as a photo light stand, pretty nicely
+My doll named Litter Lee. He's litter-lee the cutest! He comes on adventures with me, and collects scraps that we find along the way for me to take photos of, at the end of the day.
How do you organise your inspiration and ideas?
I try using my Pintrest but it sometimes just feels like the internets version of shoving things into a closet and saying "eh..I'll deal with this later". Instead, I make tons of ongoing lists. If I have a title for a list, I find myself subconsciously thinking up things to fill up that list page, through out the day.
Where do you look for inspiration?
I find a lot of inspiration by watching documentaries about people who never stopped doing what the love. I'll turn them on while I'm working and find that by the end of it, I'm smiling and inspired to keep doing what I love. A couple of my favorites that are on Netflix now are:
If you had three wishes, what would you do to make it the dream space?
+ an office chair that was sleek and colorful AND good for my back
+ a separate spot for a photo studio
+it would always smell like gardenias
Make sure to check out Chloe's blog »
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