Setting up my art studio

By Anna on seebedraw.blogspot.com

As I recently moved, I have spent much time thinking about how to set up an art studio in my new home. The following list contains a few of the things I considered:

1. What work areas do I need? I really needed three distinct work areas, for art, office, and gallery/storage of completed work. With some planning, even a small space can be configured to contain three different work areas. However, in my previous studio I had only one work area, which was problematic.
2. What do I first see when I enter the studio? I spent a few weeks moving furniture around and mocking up space with cardboard boxes before I arrived at a satisfactory solution. First, I positioned the office area close to the door, which gave the office too much visibility. Since I wanted the art to be the main focus, I ended up moving the office area to the opposite corner and instead position the art and gallery areas closer to the door. Now, every time I pass by my studio, I see the art work area and can’t wait to create!
3. Will I accept visitors or not? If you do, you may want a space to display your art right as they enter.
4. Do I prefer creative simplicity or creative clutter? Having lived in a small and cluttered space for the past several years, I yearned for a spacious studio in white, with few colors or decorations. I accomplished this by keeping only the essentials in my studio, and by using cabinets, drawer units, and closets to keep things away from my line of sight.
5. What color scheme inspires me the most? For me, a restful white! I see this as a blank sheet of paper, ready for art to happen! Some of my friends take the opposite approach, and prefer bright colors or patterns as starting-points for their imagination.
6. What is behind my desk? There are many options: a wall behind the desk for pinning up inspirational images, a blank wall, a window, or a free-standing desk without a wall behind it. I ended up with a bit of each!
7. Where do I want the light to come from? I knew that I wanted the art area positioned with natural daylight coming from the left, not only because I am righthanded, but also since I prefer setting up my subject matters daylit from the left. The only way to accomplish this was to position one table at a 90 degree angle to the wall. This table now functions as a divider between my two work areas, the office and art/gallery.
8. When do I work in my studio? Depending on work hours, the studio may be used at different times. This relates to the previous question, as a west-facing window may be fine to face in the morning, but may cause heat and glare in the afternoon and evening.
9. Do I need space for growth? At this point, my gallery area is almost empty and there is also plenty of free space on shelves and in cabinets. To be able to grow, space is definitely needed!

A final tip: I ended up mocking up my space using large cardboard moving boxes. This turned out to be very helpful as a two-dimensional plan drawing rarely conveys the three-dimensional experience of a space.