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spacelift: from stockroom to home office

I can’t believe that it’s already my 6^th year in my graduate course. I breezed through my subjects, finishing all the required units in just three semesters. Why haven’t I graduated??? I haven’t finished my thesis! I already have a topic and have begun doing library work. But all these years, between projects and writing assignments, I didn’t have enough time, energy, and free brain cells to start writing the study.

Now that everything is going very well with my family, I have the option of taking a “partial leave” this semester from design work (of course, I won’t be abandoning existing projects) and limiting writing assignments to maybe two articles per month. This way, I think I can already focus on my research.

To further help me concentrate, I decided to make myself an office/study at the stockroom behind our house. For the longest time, I have been working in the dining area. I have a desk in my bedroom but I feel claustrophobic and sleepy (because of the presence of the bed) working there. Unfortunately, working in the dining area means having to deal with constant distractions and interruptions.

Last Sunday afternoon, I cleaned the stockroom and converted a corner of the room into my office/study. Here’s a list of what I did:

1) ACCENT WALL – I wanted to paint a part of the existing white wall to define my space without using any dividers. Apart from cleaning the room, this was probably the only time-consuming part of the makeover. I initially wanted a bright color like lime green or yellow for the accent wall but decided against it because the color might just cause migraines. Instead, I mixed a dark khaki paint color using white base + burnt umber + black. To make the wall less sleepy, I made a series of slim branches by sticking ½” masking tape before painting the wall.

2) COLOR - After removing the tape, I realized that the white-and-dark khaki combination was too strong for me. To soften the white, I lightly brushed over the patterns with a pale blue-gray paint.

3) OLD FURNITURE + NEW ACCESSORIES – When the paint was completely dry, I positioned my old drafting table, mounted two cork boards on the wall (P88 each from The 88 Store), and brought in the new table lamp which I got for only P795 (from Robinson’s Department Store). I also added a small potted plant where I can stick reminders and to-do lists.

4) CHAIR SLIPCOVER – I didn’t want to spend on a new desk chair. To complete my one-day makeover, I just made a slipcover for an existing monoblock chair using a large scrap fabric.

For this makeover, I only spent around P1,160 for the paint colors (i used my dad’s leftover white latex paint for the base), paint roller, cork boards, and table lamp (the only expensive item).

I already started working in my new workspace yesterday! I just hope that all my efforts will finally lead me to a research proposal by the end of August and to a finished thesis by March. Wish me luck! -ardel