Saturday, August 9, 2014

Bedroom Makeover: Workspace Unveiling


Hi there! First off, I just wanted to say oh. my. god. I just reached 50 followers on Bloglovin which made me really, really happy, so a huge thank you to all of you follow me on that platform! It's such a big milestone for me and I would go on about how excited I am, but that's not that you came to read, aha.

Anyway, after working on it all week or maybe even longer, I don't quite remember to be honest, I finished making over my workspace! I'm so happy with how it turned out with all the gold details and the colour that is somewhat coordinated. It's a pretty big step up (in my eyes, at least) from my old desk and I can't wait to start spending more time here.

In short, I'm just really, really excited about this. Since there's not much left to say, let's hop into all the lovely new changes I made.



My desk area started out like this and was fairly organised, I guess, but it wasn't perfect by any means. There was always a stack of books and random papers on the far left and right of the desk that would gradually grow and take it over. When this photo was taken, I'd recently just bought the corkboard, so before that, that square of space looked especially empty. 

Above that area, I just had a bunch of notebooks and reference books I no longer used, so it was basically a waste of space. On the top shelf of my massive IKEA desk, there were just a bunch of boxes full of supplies and odd trinkets.

The main problem with the old setup was that I had too many things that I just didn't need, so the main thing that I had to do while making over the desk was either get rid of the things I didn't need or find them a new home. It was basically just a place where I sat to work and didn't really love it there. Recently, it'd gotten so bad that I often migrated to my bed to work instead, something that I tended to avoid doing at all costs because I like to think of my bed as a place to relax and wind down instead of a place where work would eventually take over.

I also wanted to make the space look more inspirational and thankfully, I managed to achieve that. So my desk went from looking like that (photo above), to looking like this...


Yeah, it looks a bit better, doesn't it?



On the top shelf, I rearranged the junk I had previously so it looked a bit more attractive. Starting from the far left, I have a box full of high school memories along with some sketchbooks underneath, my school sketchbook, some wooden pencils in a mason jar, a doll I got from the Narita Airport, a music box from my aunt, the letter "N" from my dad because it's the first letter of my Vietnamese name, half a high heeled shoe that my friend and I made in fourth grade, a Diana F+, a book called "100 Years of Fashion," and a box of art supplies along with some watercolour pencils underneath and chalk pastels on top.

Sorry if that was a bit long.

Above my desk, I used to only have the flowers that were painted on when I was six, but I've kind of outgrown them, so I replaced them with gold polka dots instead and I'm so happy with how they turned out. There will be a DIY of that coming up soon if any of you are interested. For these photos, you can probably still see a few flowers that are still there and that's because I conveniently ran out of spray paint, but the walls will be done soon!

I also filled that awkward space above with some fashion pun illustrations from Man Repeller that I printed out and taped onto some foam board for a bit of dimension as well as a little motivational phrase (font is Sail) spray painted on the edges. I might decide to back the fashion puns with some black paper to make them stand out a bit more, but for now, it'll stay like this.


This little corner remained mostly the same. All I did was clean up the stuff in the magazine file and spray painted it gold and added my pencil case (the Paris box) on the far left.




This area is where I keep most of my utensils and other desktop supplies. It used to be in mix matched jars, so I changed that to have a more uniform look with the flowering pots on the shelf and the mason jars and doily-esque container and dish (both from IKEA). Before, nothing really had its own place, so it would get messy really easily, but now, everything has a jar of some sort to go into, so it'll be a lot easier to stay organised.



The chandelier in my bedroom doesn't give off much light, so my desk is usually pretty dark in the evening. As I'm writing this, there's literally one lightbulb that's actually working in said-chandelier where there are usually five. Yep.

Anyway, since it's so dark and my eyesight is already so bad, I got a desk lamp from IKEA called the Ranarp so I can get a bit more light, especially when I'm doing art projects late at night for school.

I also got a little candle dish that's the exact same one as before called the Skurar candle dish where I stashed all my post it notes because as you can tell, I kind of like to use them. I also have a matching Skurar candle holder that I used to hold all the things I use on a daily basis. 

Behind that, I have a vase with the leftover flowers from my flower crown DIY. Yes, I realise that the flower stems are just floating in the air and I'm planning to get something to fill up the bottom as soon as I can. It was a completely spontaneous idea and I really wanted to share my workspace with you today, hence the random hovering flowers.

On the corkboard at the far back of my desk, I have a bunch of pictures I ripped out of fashion magazines from school when we were doing a cut and paste activity in art class. I also have a few calendars and to-do lists, as well as my 2014 blogging schedule that I cheekily hid with the flowers. The inspiration board is pretty sparse right now, but I'm going to slowly build it up as I go along.


This top area hasn't really changed much. I just got rid of the clunky dictionary that served no purpose in my room and rearranged the journals and books a bit. I also added some fashion books on the far right including "Coco Chanel: The Legend and the Life" by Justine Picardie, "Blogging Your Way to the Front Row" by Yuli Ziv, "Fashion Design Course" by Steven Faerm, and "100 Dresses" by Harold Koda.

I also have a unicorn canopic jar that I made in art class this year. Due to the time crunch, the clay didn't dry properly and a few bits and pieces broke off, hence the slightly dull horn and the bottom part of the jar that hasn't yet been painted. Despite its flaws, I still like it, so that's why it's sitting there staring me down as I work away.


Finally, there's my desk chair that used to be just a boring old black that has been transformed to this! My desk chair is one of the first things I see when I wake up in the morning and while I ignored the fact that I'm pretty much blind when I wake up because I don't have my glasses on, I still want something that's really motivational and inspirational to wake up to, so I painted the words "carpe the hell out of this diem" onto the back of my chair. Again, like the polka dots, there will be a DIY post coming up for this chair soon.

That's pretty much it for my new and improved workspace! I really, really love how it turned out, even if there are still a few bits and pieces that I want to fix like my garbage can that's so out in the open and possibly spray painting my pushpins gold because I seem to have an obsession with spray painting things gold lately. I've pretty much used up two whole cans of gold spray paint in the last week.

What do you think of the improvements? What is your favouite thing about it? Do you have any suggestions for other changes I can make to my space? Leave your comments and share your thoughts below!


Thank you so much for reading!
- J


No comments:

Post a Comment