The Making of an Office

Follow along on our journey in the making of an office. It’s not just about throwing a desk in a room, this was about so much more for our little family.

It’s time to make some changes. For over 10 years we haven’t had an office. We’ve had our bedroom with a planted desk in an awkward place, and then there’s the couch. Let’s be honest, we only used the desk like three times because who wants their bedroom to be a workplace too? But now it’s the making of an office in the Sweet Basil home.

Tackling our front room has been on our to-do list since the moment we moved into our new home, but holy moly that’s a lot to take on. We knew we wanted it to be an office, but not just any office. We wanted a space that was full of light. Did you know that studies show that students perform better in school and in general people when there is a window and good light in the workspace? In fact, many colleges are building new building full of windows and lights whereas in the past it was thought that it was distracting.

In planning our room we weren’t just looking for a place to put our computer, we knew we’d be creating a space to get creative, increase in understanding and learning and we wanted to do it as a family. Not one desk, but multiple so that more than one person could be in the room at the same time.

The Making of an Office

We started by painting the room a color of white that wouldn’t feel harsh like a hospital, but would still reflect light and allow everything to be a canvas that we could change out decorations and textiles to fit the holidays and mood of our family. Blue just wasn’t for us. Which is funny because it’s the favorite color of the family. In tackling painting we knew one thing, we wanted an efficient and quick way to do it. I know, rolling and paintbrushes are the normal way to do things, but in our lifetime we are bound to do this many more times and so why not find the method that’s going to pay off in the long run, so we got ourselves a Graco Magnum x7. It’s amazing.

1. Tape off everything and then add paper and tape it off a little more. Spraying is efficient but it’s easy to spray the ceiling if you haven’t taped well.
2. Now tape the heck out of your doors because paint will be in the air and settle around your house and I may or may not be speaking from experience.
3. Jump up and down and treat yourself to a big, fat, hot, gooey brownie full of melty chocolate chips because you just painted an entire room in a fraction of the time and friends, it’s ridiculously smooth, perfect and doesn’t need a single bit of touching up. 

And in case you’re wondering, we went with Sherwin-Williams alabaster. It’s a slightly warmer white and though you can’t tell as much right now, it’s absolutely lovely. The trim we just did untinted latex paint so it’s a nice, bright white.

Casing out the windows and doorway were a great way to add height without actually cutting bigger windows or doors. Of course, as soon as we cased out the doorway we decided that french doors were a must as it would provide a quiet space to work, however we feel strongly that computers shouldn’t be in closed off rooms as we live in a world where the internet is full of a whole lot of junk and this whole internet bullying thing is not the only part, pornography and hate are everywhere so we’ve made the decision in our home that closed doors and electronics isn’t happening. French doors allow for quiet without secrets.

Above the door we chose to leave a space for a transom, allowing more light and again, it gives the feeling of height without any dramatic and expensive construction.

The most important thing is not the paint or the doors, it’s about the functionality. Cade and I love when we can put things away, so everything is clean and tidy. But most of all, if there’s a space for everything we have less picking up to do. That’s our favorite part. So we searched high and low for cabinets and pretty much ended up totally overwhelmed. And then we discovered MasterBrand Cabinets. THANK HEAVENS. It’s been 10 times easier to go through a site that has absolutely everything in one place. It’s like amazon but for all of your cabinet needs. We started by finding the style we liked, chose our wood, asked a design expert more questions than I ever thought possible and she was all kinds of amazing in helping us.

We cannot wait to show you more and if you have any must haves for your own office please tell us, we are still learning how to do this!