Sewing Room Organization Part #1: Shelves

So this will be part 1 of a very long long process of really putting my sewing room together in a functional and organized way. Every sewer or crafter knows just how easily their craft room turns into a tornado zone! I know you all have paths through the messes like I do. :)

I’m starting my process with some shelving for the bins upon bins upon bins of fabric that I have. :) These shelves aren’t adorably styled or anything, but they are functional and the bins are labeled. That makes for a happy me. :)

I don’t have real before pictures of what this section used to look like, but here’s what most of the sewing room looks like (this isn’t even the worst corner really, believe it or not!).

To make the shelves, I started with some pre-made shelving uprights from Menards and 1”x12”x8’ pine boards, two per shelf.

I put the unit together temporarily (with just a few screws) outside for painting. Grandpa helped me with all this, so even though it was hot and muggy, it wasn’t too bad.

I painted the unit with some old oil-based paint we found in the basement (with a pretty cool label, and like many oil-based paints, it mixed up like new! I don’t know if it had ever been opened, really) in, you guessed it, Grandpa’s trusty Wagner Wide Shot Power Painter. What would I do without that thing?

I was very happy that just a nice, thick coat was all I needed. (Granted, I knew this shelf would be housing large plastic bins in the basement, so I wasn’t being too picky.)

Then, I somehow man-handled all the individual pieces into the basement by myself and installed it there. It’s held together mostly by itself (as the shelves screw into the uprights, they sturdy the whole unit up and keep it pretty plumb and level…though I helped it along of course!) but I did put a couple of concrete screws in it, too, to hold it to the wall and stop it from tipping. I think I used 1 or 2 concrete screws straight through the uprights and a concrete screw in an L bracket somewhere else. Just those 2 or 3 screws into the wall make a huge difference!

Once everything was secured together, I filled them up!

I have some more plans for shelves like this elsewhere, some plans for shelves on wheels, and I’ll hopefully come up with some other fabric and notions storage solutions along the way as well. I will keep you updated in this long process, which I’m sure will be very drawn out. :)

What have you been building lately?