Shop Transformation: 6.Inventory Room

This room was reeeeally bad. Yikes! Would you want me to store your stuff in here?! I understand this used to be some sort of cold storage for the flowers. In fact, a large section of the floor was simply plywood. The walls were still the 60's paneling over the original tongue and groove wood walls. As you can see, the paneling was never painted. The far right wall had water damage from the previous leaky roof. To The Full Construction ripped down that paneling, as well as the ceiling and replaced the wall with new paneling. I would find out months later while priming that primer would not adhere to the new paneling. There was a section in the entry next to the front door and this one wall -- the primer would just separate on contact. I tried sanding and then priming again. Nope. So, I waited for the weather conditions to improve. After many attempts, I was fiiiiinally able to make paint stick. What a pain.

View from the work table into the Inventory Room.

The two windows to the left get a lot of direct sunlight (like the assembly room), so I installed faux wood blinds and thermal curtains in here, too. I added a third set on the single window for consistency.

I bought the 4 Origami shelves second hand and had them in the center of the room for a while because the perimeter still creeped me out a bit. But, after trying to make it work, I just hated it. How you see it in these photos is how it is now. These Sterilite storage bins from Target are a perfect fit! We store everything from drawer dividers and decor to light bulbs and space heaters (cuz for a couple months, this place actually gets cold with no central heat). The open space in the middle of the room is where we hold furniture, decor, bins and containers for client projects waiting on installation day. Here's a secret . . . I moved that kind of stuff out before the photo shoot, lol! Otherwise, you would not have been able to appreciate the full impact of this room. Hmmm, the more I look at it, I think this is my favorite pic of the shop! This view is from the next room I will reveal.

Tiny storage. Insert heart eyes here! (Also, thank you Jenni for helping me organize this wall! Sometimes, I need a push to tackle even the fun tasks.)

This is definitely one of my favorite tools in the shop. Growing up, my dad always had (still does) these tiny drawers in his workshop (aka "the barn"). Something about them fascinated me. I was drawn to the detailed organization they allowed. Literally, a place for everything. Sure, shoe boxes and plastic storage bins were good for certain things, but the small things...mattered.

I was my mom's sidekick when I was really young. She was always working on home improvement projects. We were always taking trips various hardware stores. The tiered nuts and bolts tower that spun was my favorite thing. In fact, when I first started dreaming up how the shop would look and function, that was something I tried to track down. In the end, I went with the plastic drawers like my dad has. Not one, but four of them! I knew that would leave me with a few undesignated drawers to fill up eventually...room to grown into, I suppose.

Here is the progression of the far wall:

The very first photo taken during our initial walk through.

The old ceiling was pulled down and part of the paneling, exposing the tongue and groove wall.

aaaaaannd nowwww...

Well, I guess I have two "word art" pieces in the shop, lol! This one on the right is Scripture that reminds me "God's grace is sufficient for me and His power is made perfect in my weakness." It is a simple reminder that I cannot go a day without Him. I could not have accomplished any of this remodel without His strength, which was especially obvious on days I was just spent and frustrated and feeling defeated and overwhelmed. And there were a lot of those days. This was hard y'all! But, it was worth it and knowing that it would be kept me going.

If I have made a bulletin board for you in the last two years, I probably used this ironing board (above) to iron the fabric and the work table in the next room to assemble it. Speaking of the next room, these next before and afters are facing the work room. Another great angle!