The Shop Refurb

The room was quite messy and used as a dumping ground, the first step was to tidy up a little, but not a lot could be done as most of it had to be sorted and put in cupboards and drawers that were not built yet!

  

Then the stuff was shifted into the middle of the room while the walls were lined and insulated.

 

Next, the space was cleared so that the sub floor could be fitted.

 

 

The worst thing about this was that the stuff had to go somewhere and it went upstairs thereby making a mess of the room that had just been done! 

 

The chosen flooring was a Walnut laminate and was fitted quite quickly.

Well, forging on, the display cabinet was made and finished and glass shelves fitted. I added a few cards to the display, but the intention is for other gifts to be displayed in this cabinet as the cards are going to be displayed in retail card racks.

 

The office area was designed and fitted and matching base units for the retail card displays.

 

The counter is the next thing to build and then to decorate the place. As soon as finished the refurbishment I will get on with making stock to fill the place and organise the place so that it is clear enough to be able to hold workshops.  Hopefully before Christmas.

Quooker Tap

The hot water in the craft room is supplied by a Quooker boiling tap that is one of those rare "must haves".  This simple, ultra-safe idea immediately renders kettles out of date and takes kitchens a giant leap forward.  This is one of those gadgets that Trendsetters buy, their friends see it and immediately want one, kitchen designers and chefs recommend it and eventually it becomes a "must have" in every kitchen.

Enchanted Space recommended the tap to me and I immediately fell in love with it!  As it says, it is a "must have" once you have seen it!

     

The cold water supply was fitted with an inline filter cartridge so the drinking water is more pure and the Quooker Boiler would be less likely to fur up.

Paint and Decoration

After all the painting, the walls were lined, the workstation was painted and the wallpaper was put up. I must admit the wallpaper was a surprise to me but I have come to love it. My original thought was that it was too busy for the craft room but the colours have been incorporated into the stationery and signs now and after putting storage on the walls it looks much better.  The opposite walls have been done in matching complimentary papers. I even chose the chairs to match!

The workstation was painted.

 

The carpet was fitted, I chose a neutral colour because the walls were patterned.

 

Storage was put on the walls, here is some quilting templates and some of The Glitter Girls Keepsake embossing boards. I still have a few items to put up, including the ribbon storage. The opposite wall has more of the embossing boards.

 

The rubber stamps were too crowded so I have since added extra shelves inbetween the ones already here. I intend rearranging and putting into a catalogue so it is easy to see what stamps I have and on which shelf to find them. My unmounted and clear stamps are kept in the files under the shelves.

 

The magnetic board has been stuck in place. That was not an easy task, because I did it by myself and would have been twice as quick if there had been two of us. I then put nails on which to hang the Fiskars embossing plates.

 

There is still a lot of stuff to do and I will show the finished pictures when it is all done, but I am still sorting all the crafting stuff out and putting away.

My good friend, Bob Gee gave me some money to buy chairs for the business and I got some bar stools in the colours to match the wallpaper.

 

Keep following to view more progress, then onto the shop itself.

My Shop Refurb in Stages

I will show the refurbishment of the shop in its varying stages to show the development over time. I actually moved into the premises last November so it has taken a year to get to where I am now.

I started with the workstation upstairs. I wanted a large craft table enough for 8 people at a time so that I can run workshops and demonstrations. There are a lot of crafters out there who haven't got the place to craft as they would like, and also a lot of folks who need inspiration and guidance, so my workshops would be perfect for them.

This is the empty room that I started with.

  

and this is what it looks like today.  Not completely cleared and arranged yet, and there is also a few finishing touches to add by way of storage.

  

I will show the progress of the workshop and a finished picture when I am ready for opening.

I employed my sons company Enchanted Space to do the refurbishment and we started with the worktable itself.

  

Then we moved onto insulating the walls and adding some kitchen units to form a nice storage area.  Included in this is a kitchen sink to provide water and a means of cleaning up after messy projects.

Next, the wall cupboards, lighting and tiles.

 

Attention turned to the sewing area.

 

The storage above the stairs came next.  I wanted a storage area to hide stuff away and make maximum use of the area for crafting.  I was still wanting an area that could be dedicated to scrapbooking, so Stephen, my son, suggested that we create a storage area above the dead space at the top of the stairs.  I was thrilled with his suggestion as it also gave me an extra wall and I was already planning some sort of magnetic board for my dies.

 

The last main construction was my scrapbooking area. We used similar kitchen units to the opposite side and also some of the same wall tiles.

That is the end of the construction of the craft room. I will go through decoration and craft storage separately. Hope you find this interesting, but for me it is a nice story to the foundation of my craft business, Top It All.