I moved at the end of last year, so I have a new studio to share!

As I’ve written before, I’m a pretty tidy person in general, so what feels messy to me might look like like a clean space to you. I’m coming off an intense couple of months of sewing for Spring Quilt Market, so while that’s underway, I tend to stack things in piles on my biggest available surface – the top of my fabric drawers:

(I would have taken pix at the height of the chaos, but there was a lot of secret fabric in there that I’m not allowed to share until after it debuts at Market)

A lot of the fabric drawers were so tight that I could barely get my hands in them, and I find this really unpleasant to deal with; it makes me want to just not use the fabric in there, which then leads to shopping trips (and often to duplicate purchases!) Thus the first order of business was to re-sort the drawers, and then to file away all the fabric on top of them.

I have a lot of hand-dyed fabric, and while I don’t want to get rid of it (I use when I teach hand-dyeing) I don’t need it at the ready. I decided to pull it from the drawers and move it into storage tubs that can live in my office closet.

This freed up three drawers for shifting and filing the rest:

I still have some batting to absorb, but I’ll get to that soon – it’s destined to be frankenbatted into some charity quilts for my guild. I also want to have a good sort on the rack at the back of the picture, but that will have to wait a week or two while I finish up my market obligations.

I store fabric mostly by type/substrate (batik, cotton, barkcloth, canvas) and then by genre (solid, print, etc.) I have specific drawers for fabric with text, skulls, and robots/space. Some of the fabric is sorted by manufacturer – this is so that when I design with it, I don’t inadvertently mix in other companies’ fabrics. I also broke up all my fat quarter towers this time as then I’ll actually use the fabrics in them – seriously… I had some that are 4 or 5 years old that had never been touched.

I keep large cuts of solids in the drawers, but the main solid stash (mostly fat quarters and smaller) lives in smaller boxes:

I’m not a scrap quilter, so while I set aside scraps as I work, I periodically bundle them up to giveaway on Instagram (follow me here!) My next round of giveaways will include scraps from the quilts I made for this market season out of fabric that isn’t out just yet

I think the most important thing about fabric storage is to find what works best for you, and to do it in a way that makes your fabric available to you for both inspiration and use. If you can’t get to it, it can’t get used!

I don’t need to see all mine out on a shelf, so having it in drawers works fine. I also would never bother with storing it around boards as it would take up way too much space to do that. I store by type and color, but I know other people work well storing by size.

I’m also a fan of periodically sorting through your entire stash, both to sort in the new treasures and to purge the old. I think we all buy fabric that we outgrow before it gets used, and if you get it out of the house you have room to buy more! I send my no-longer-loved fabric to my guild’s robust charity quilting program, or our monthly Free Fabric table. Your local Project Linus group is always a good place for fabric you don’t want to keep.

The whole studio! I find tidy space so inviting!

Please check out the rest of the blog hop!

May 1 – Teri Lucas – www.terificreations.com
May 2 – Tammy Silvers – www.tamarinis.typepad.com
May 3 – Emily Breclaw – www.thecaffeinatedquilter.com
May 4 – Amalia Morusiewicz – www.FUNfromAtoZ.com
May 5 – John Kubiniec – www.bigrigquilting.com/blog/
May 6 – Debby Brown – www.higheredhands.blogspot.com
May 7 – Melissa Marie Collins – www.melissamariecollins.blogspot.com
May 8 – Delve MIY – www.fronddesignstudios.wordpress.com
May 9 – Misty Cole – www.mistycole.com
May 10 – Sam Hunter – www.huntersdesignstudio.com/blog (you’re here!)
May 11 – Dale Ashera-Davis – www.dalead.wordpress.com
May 12 – Sara Mika – www.mockpiestudio.blogspot.com
May 13 – Sarah Trumpp – www.Wonderstrumpet.com
May 14 – Carma Halterman – www.beanstrings.blogspot.com
May 15 – Jessica Darling – www.jessicakdarling.com
May 16 – Lisa Chin – www.lisachinartist.com
May 17 – Sally Johnson – www.sallysquiltingcorner.blogspot.com
May 18 – Mandy Leins – www.mandalei.com/blog
May 19 – Shruti Dandekar – www.13woodhouseroad.com
May 20 – Jane Davila – www.janedavila.com
May 21 – Ebony Love – www.lovebugstudios.com
May 22 – Cheryl Sleboda – blog.muppin.com

The post Spring Clean Your Studio 2017 – New Studio! appeared first on Hunter's Design Studio.

When Cheryl Sleboda asked me to join the Spring Cleaning hop again, her timing was perfect. I’m in the middle of #SewingAtTheSpeedOfSam for Spring Quilt Market, and she caught me on a very messy day. So I took a few pix for my before shots!

I was in the middle of too many things at once… working on a new quilt on the design wall, another getting bound and sleeved, materials coming in (that big box is a bolt of Warm ‘n’ White batting), and packaging orders to go out. This is NOT a level of chaos that makes me happy!

As I wrote last year, I tend to be a pretty tidy person as it helps me stay creative.

One of the things that was bothering me (as usual) were stacks of fabrics that weren’t put away. I don’t mind them being out when I’m working, but once the project is done the decks need to clear. This time, rather than just shoving things into drawers, I took the time to really organize the colors in the most offending drawers:

Not only does this make me happy, I love how inspiring it is to see runs of color together… I’m already mulling new ideas from looking at these!

Since last year, I’ve acquired a couple more storage pieces from Ikea to make things a little easier around here. The first was a trusty Billy Bookcase. It squeezed into the corner of my studio, which used to be full of boxes of art materials I’m not currently using. I put them into my patio storage shed, and then shifted a few things onto the new shelves. In case you didn’t know this, Ikea now sells extra shelves for the Billy so that you can really customize the space. They also sell an extender for the top of the book case so you can squeak out another vertical foot if you need it. I used both the extra shelves and the extender on this one:

The second thing I bought was the ever-so-trendy Raskog Cart. I’ve been eyeing these, and had been plotting a reason to own one for a while. I filled it with materials related to handwork and embroidery, and it’s so great to be able to roll it next to the chair I sit in to bind or stitch, then roll it away when I’m done. I LOVE the retro turquoise color!

Here’s a pano of the tidy space – aahhhh… that feels better!

Follow along with my friends below, and don’t forget to link up with Cheryl on April 29th!

April 20th- Toni Smith – http://www.quiltoni.com/tonis-blog.html/

April 21st – Sam Hunter – https://huntersdesignstudio.com/

April 22nd – Tracey Mooney – http://www.sewsupportive.com/

April 23rd – Pepper Cory – http://peppercory.blogspot.com/

April 24th – Lisa Chin – http://somethingcleveraboutnothing.blogspot.com/

April 25th – Andrea Davis – http://www.sewtofit.com/

April 26th – Misty Cole – http://www.mistycole.com/blog/

April 27th – Amalia Morusiewicz – http://funfromatoz.com/

April 28th – Jenelle Montilone – http://trashn2tees.blogspot.com/

April 29th – Cheryl Sleboda – http://blog.muppin.com

The post Spring Clean Your Studio 2016 – Come On In! appeared first on Hunter's Design Studio.