I have one room to myself so I had to make it functional as a computer desk, painting desk, bookcase, and all over storage. It was a big task but needed to be done as I had a huuuge mish-mash of old furniture barely able to hold all my "stuff". It's amazing how much you can accumulate in art school...
Anyway.
After hunting around, I came upon a blog that held the perfect plans to my dilemma, you can read about it HERE.
Long story short, I was able to get all the parts I needed from Ikea and local hardware stores and I built the PERFECT workstation!! Here's a couple views of what I put together...
(I apologize for the fuzziness in them, due to how dark it is in my room all my working lights are pointed towards my desk.... doesn't help with photos LOL)
You can tell it's quite a bit different than the inspiration photos of her blog, but we both have different needs of our spaces.
Now for the components,
*The main desk I got years ago during art school. It's built like a drafting table and can be hinged up and down.
*2 IKEA Expedit shelving units on each side.
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* Then I have a piece of white shelf board I bought at a local hardware store, sitting atop each of the shelving units creating a deep shelf above the desk. These were made for closet shelves I believe. It's a heavy duty board that has a rounded edge so I didn't have to paint anything.
*Underneath the top shelf, I have a floating shelf out of the same piece of board as the top. I bought 2 cheap shelf hangers and fit it directly above my computer. A lot of my easy access tools are up there as well as some fun inspirational things.
*Right up snug next to the right shelving unit is an Exedit bookcase I bought years ago. This has been an amazing piece of furniture for me. I tilted it on its side and fit it perfectly alongside the shelving unit.
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As you can see in the pictures below, I have some drawer sets and cupboards in the shelf boxes.
These are amazing! They're shelf inserts from.. you guessed it! IKEA You build up the shelves, fit it into an insert box and then slide it into the square space of the unit. Brilliant.
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Now the rest of the contents of the desk were made up of many of my existing materials. The only other things I purchased from Ikea were 5 packs of cardboard magazine boxes to hold upright materials like specialty papers, job files etc... I plan on covering those with fun papers to add a pop of color to the dark and white look to the desk.
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So there you have it! I'm super excited about this space and if you have checked out my post of the Fox and the Hound painting I did, you can see that a full size canvas fits on this desk! It has also been bolted to the wall so there's no danger of it falling over or moving around. I'm so happy I discovered Jen at I Heart Organizing Her idea of the desk was just incredibly inspiring and perfect for what I was looking for. I think for everything - mind you, I already had the desk and the double Epedit unit, the cost was around $250. Which is nothing compared to what you would pay for a unit like this already put together. And it's completely customizable!
I'm still adding touches here and there, I lined all the drawers with fun paper and eventually, I'd like to cover the desktop in glass and be able to slide inspiration pieces underneath. But as far as adding anything else, for now I'm set! On the walls around the workstation, I'm collecting inspiring artwork and hope to have my own little art gallery all around me while I work. That's an ongoing hunt :)
If you have any questions on how I put this together, please let me know in the comments and go check out Jen's blog!!
