Organized Home

Planning your sewing and crafts space?  These books on setting up an organized sewing space tell you everything you need to know to put it all back--and make it work!

Setting Up Your Sewing Space: From Small Areas To Complete Workshops  by Myrna Giesbrecht

Design-oriented, hands-on and loaded with ideas, this book is a top-notch guide to setting up a sewing area or sewing room.

Giesbrecht guides your personal analysis of sewing needs and available space, culminating in a sewing space layout.  The second half of the book is chock-full of specific ideas for storage and project organization for both fashion sewing and quilting.

Those who frequent quilt classes or sewing workshops will enjoy the chapter on "Sew Far From Home".  Need even more inspiration?  Giesbrecht concludes the book with a tour of real-life sewing spaces.

Dream Sewing Spaces: Design & Organization for Spaces Large & Small by Lynette Ranney Black
(Second edition available April 1, 2010; find copies of the first edition here)

Are you the "show me!" type?  This lavishly-illustrated guidebook from Palmer/Pletsch will inspire your search for an organized sewing area.

This book's visual strengths complement Setting Up Your Sewing Space: From Small Areas To Complete Workshops 's more analytical approach.  Dream over color photographs of ultimate sewing studios as you tour workspaces of sewing mavens Marta Alto, Pati Palmer and other fiber artists and seamstresses.  Investigate cabinetry, surfaces, lighting and electrical requirements for an efficient sewing space. 

Black uses a centers-based approach.  You'll define your needs and arrange space to include design, pressing, sewing and cutting centers.

Final chapters cover storage and organization, using different household spaces to hold your sewing workspace, and the demands of professional and specialty sewing:  bridal, quilting, home dec and wearable art. 

Savvy computer-using readers will appreciate the tips on integrating computer use into the sewing workspace!