Hobby area WWYD

[fernweh]

We have a 3 bedroom house. H and I sleep separately and the 3rd room is my office (WFH about 90% of the time).

I’m focusing more on hobbies this year and want a dedicated space that I can use. My options are to share my office with hobbies or set up a space in the basement.

Our basement is unfinished; 1/2 is used as a home gym, the other 1/2 is laundry and storage. It would take some cleaning/organizing but I could probably find a decent size space down there to set up a space. It’s just kind of gloomy and basementy down there.

The room I use as my office is on the small size but for work purposes I don’t use much of it; just a desk. Again with some cleaning/organizing I could have quite a bit of space for hobbies. There is more light and it’s a more inviting space. My only hesitation is the distraction factor if I start integrating work/hobby space. Would I get distracted from work if the hobby side is cluttered? Would I be tempted to work more if my computer/phone is sitting right there while I’m trying to relax? I don’t know.

WYDD in this situation?

[glw]

I would do combo office/hobby room, or, move your work desk into your bedroom and have a dedicated hobby room.

[meanie]

I would do a shared space in your office so you can be in a space you enjoy. What hobbies are you thinking? There are these cool fold out workstations I keep seeing on FB.

[fernweh]

Apr 3, 2024 12:36:09 GMT -5 meanie said:

I would do a shared space in your office so you can be in a space you enjoy. What hobbies are you thinking? There are these cool fold out workstations I keep seeing on FB.

Right now I am dabbling in sewing/quilting and watercolor painting. I actually was considering one of those desks.

[deadwing]

I would carve out some space in the basement. I WFH full time, I like having a dedicated office space. I can't imagine being tempted to work more if I was in my home office outside of working hours. I spend so many hours in there, I'm ready to spend time elsewhere during my non-working hours.

I recently did some work on my unfinished basement to make it a more usable space. I was lucky that I was starting from a non-gloomy space. The walls are white and I get decent light through the windows. I had to do a lot of cleaning and rearranging to open up the floor space. For me, I wanted to make the basement into a dog training space. I was able to get some second hand mats to provide safe footing to my dogs. Again, I got lucky and wound up with bright blue mats. Most dog training mats are black and that would have really negated the brightness.

I don't know what hobbies you are trying to find space for, but I think a basement can be have it's gloominess remediated with a little elbow grease.

It's still a bit of a work in progress

[meanie]

Apr 3, 2024 12:41:04 GMT -5 fernweh said:

Apr 3, 2024 12:36:09 GMT -5 meanie said:

I would do a shared space in your office so you can be in a space you enjoy. What hobbies are you thinking? There are these cool fold out workstations I keep seeing on FB.

Right now I am dabbling in sewing/quilting and watercolor painting. I actually was considering one of those desks.

Hmmm doesn't quilting take up a lot of space when you are laying out the fabric pieces? That might change my answer...

Painting I would definitely do where the lighting is best though

Sounds like you will have to take over the house!

[livinitup]

How would your H feel about sleeping in the basement?

[litskispeciality]

Quilting and painting most likely require more light, but work/life balance leans me toward hobby in the basement. If it was in the budget I'd fix up the basement a bit and make that a zen space so you aren't thinking about work when you're done for the day/can de-stress through your hobby. Also think about will you have enough space in the office to keep your in-progress projects going, or do you need to fold everything up and re-start every time? That sets me back on knitting or crocheting.

My mom sewed/quilted and it took up the whole kitchen table plus her machine station and all of the fabric (border line hoarder situation). I can see why people have a separate dedicated sewing room.

[Susie]

Basement wouldn't work for me, so it would have to be a shared office/craft room.  If I'm sewing/etc., I need better light than I've been able to achieve in the basement.

[ssmjlm]

As pp said, quilting takes up space. Piecing a quilt requires a big area.

I would lean toward the basement. My mom uses some bigger task lights around her sewing machine so she can see. She also had a pretty decent sized sewing cabinet because she does make quilts. (She doesn't do the long arm quilting, but does the tops and bindings.) She doesn't really have room for a long arm quilter unless she loses a bedroom.

[mcsangel2]

Seems like you would need a lot of space for sewing and quilting. How much space is there in the basement vs the office? How much exercise equipment is set up that you have to work around?

I think what I would do would be a combination of both places. I would probably have most painting accessories in the office where the light is better, and the majority of your sewing supplies in the basement.

[mel]

Could you put your office in the basement, then use the office room as your hobby room?

[whattheheck]

If your office is a dedicated work space would changing that have a tax implication?

[rhian]

How much time do you spend on your hobby? If it's only a few hours a week, I'd probably do the basement, both to keep your work space separate and give you more space. But if you're spending like 20 hours a week, I'd prefer a more pleasant space and would pick to share the office.

If you need more space than the room currently has, is there another, non-basement location you could move your office to, especially since you only use the desk?

[fernweh]

Apr 3, 2024 13:57:47 GMT -5 mcsangel2 said:

Seems like you would need a lot of space for sewing and quilting. How much space is there in the basement vs the office? How much exercise equipment is set up that you have to work around?

I think what I would do would be a combination of both places. I would probably have most painting accessories in the office where the light is better, and the majority of your sewing supplies in the basement.

I like this idea; this is what I’m leaning toward. The exercise equipment is in a separate walled off area and would interfere with quilting area at all. I would just need to organize the seasonal storage that is currently spread out haphazardly and then there would be plenty of room. I might also do smaller sewing projects in office area and anything that requires more room in the basement.

[mrspez07]

We remodeled our basement a few years ago. Before that I had set up a small desk , table and shelves in a corner of my utility room to sew. It was dusty, ended up having other stuff encroaching into it all the time. It worked out ok. It was next to the window, so that helped. It was nice to also not worry as much about mess.
With the remodel, we built a room intended to be my craft/sewing room. It’s got nice tables, lots of storage, good light and next to the same window and ceiling lights. It’s a beautiful space and I appreciate it. However, I also use it 1-2x a week for work, and I’m finding that it makes me not want to spend more time in there after work to craft. I do get distracted sometimes, but it’s mostly the opposite. I have started trying to clean up my work stuff every night when I’m done, putting the extra monitor, keyboard, mouse away so that if I do feel like crafting I can jump in. It helps a bit.

ETA: I’m a quilter and then also do cross stitch, but that travels around the house with me, that is mostly done on the couch.