Creating a Decorator’s Home Office – One Room Challenge Week 2

So a lot to update you on my progress in the One Room Challenge Fall 2018 series, sponsored by Better Homes and Gardens. In case you missed it, I’m redecorating my home office in just six weeks. Am I crazy? Yes! Is this pushing me to complete something I probably would have procrastinated doing? Definitely. Now on to the One Room Challenge Week 2 progress!

About the One Room Challenge

For the One Room Challenge Fall 2018 series, 20 featured designers (and guest participants like me) have challenged themselves to make over a room in six weeks, and document the process as they go. To follow along with all of the designers and their renovations so far, visit the Fall 2018 One Room Challenge Blog. You can also check back here every Sunday to see my progress on the Color Joy Interiors blog.

Getting Rid of the Old – One Room Challenge Week 2

As you recall, my home office was full of dark furniture. It was in great shape for being 15 years old, Honestly,I hated to part with it, but was ready for a change to something lighter. So to get rid of the old furniture quickly, I decided to sell it on a Facebook buy group in my local area. These are great if you live in a larger suburb or metro area because you can find people who are looking for used furniture and decor. 

My old office desk, after clearing some of the clutter. I donated some of these organizing bins to Goodwill, and sold the desk through Facebook to a nice family who was excited to get it.

I was lucky enough to find a nice family who was updating their home office and wanted to use my furniture. So I sold the whole lot of it for $250. Not bad for putting back into my renovation budget. And I also sold a storage bench that we weren’t using for $50 and a toy set of my girls’ for $100. Since new furniture is more expensive than used, I will need this extra cash to offset my expenses. This was a primary goal of my One Room Challenge Week 2.

Clearing the Clutter: One Room Challenge Week 2 Goal

As for the rest of the room, I spent a majority of my week clearing out the clutter. I recycled a ton of paper, and threw away other items. Then I donated supplies I didn’t need to my local Goodwill store, The rest I moved over to my bedroom until I can finish painting and finding new furniture. Currently, there are boxes and bins underneath my bed, in my walk-in closet, and even in the little tiny space underneath my dresser!

Do you spy some ink cartridges underneath my bedroom chest of drawers? You do what you have to do when you’re renovating a room! Luckily we had a little bit of extra space to spare.

Out with the Old, In with the New…

Whenever I’m renovating a room, I get excited at the possibility of all of the new decor items I can use in the room. As I’m out shopping, I will often pick up something for a room that I’m renovating, even if I’m not to the final decorating stage yet. In some cases, I want to reuse something I’ve already purchased or had in the room, but may want to update it in some way. So here are some items that will serve as inspiration pieces for my home office renovation:

This globe was used by my husband’s grandmother, and I’ve had it in my office for the past decade. It will serve as a colorful inspiration piece in my new home office, with a little refresh.

I love the mint green color of this framed art piece. I love the saying even more.

Picked up this cute little paper clip wall art at a garage sale for around $1. It will be perfect in my new home office. It’s actually larger than it looks in this picture.

Found this wall art at Bed, Bath and Beyond over the summer. This is what I hope to do in my new office! The background’s a sweet, pink color that I love, and I like the copper clip too.

Office Furniture Shopping – One Room Challenge Week 2 Goal

While I love decorating, I find furniture shopping to be a little more challenging. Since I will need to order furniture in order to get it in the room and assemble it on time, I can’t waste any time. Therefore, I spent a lot of time this week looking online at Amazon, Wayfair, Overstock, as well as several local furniture stores’ inventory. Here’s what I discovered:

Some of the Office Furniture I’m considering:

There are lots of options for white furniture (this is the color I’m going with to make the room lighter and brighter). However, one of the trends is minimalist space, so many of the desks have open shelving rather than closed file folders. I know that I will have some files that I need to store, and may have to buy a separate filing cabinet just for those items. Here are some of the styles I’m considering:

I like the idea of this South Shore craft desk, which is on casters so it could be rolled around the room. The pullout drawer would also be handy for my sewing machine, but no file space!

As you can see, this desk set has some storage options, but not a lot of file space. I like the clean, modern lines on this office suite. I’ll definitely need some book storage too.

This credenza could be used as a printer table, and to store paper supplies and a few other things. Again, it has the same, modern lines as the others.

A See Jane Work file cabinet would be a cute option for storage. I love that it’s also a seat! What a great idea. I will need more storage than this, though.

Room for Overnight Guests

As you may recall from Week 1 of my Fall One Room Challenge blog, I wanted to find a way to incorporate a space for overnight guests in my office. Currently, my home office is our only spare bedroom, so our family has to stay on a couch when they spend the night. I’d love to build a Murphy bed or have a pull-out couch in this home office, but there’s just not enough room. But I did find this colorful option from Weekends Only that I’m seriously considering: 

I love the mid-century nod to this teal sofa bed. It folds down to flat so that you can sleep here. I tried it out in the store and it was comfortable enough for guests. It just might work!

The Challenge of Space Planning

One of the biggest challenges I always face when designing a room is getting all of the furniture to fit properly. I will see a piece that I love and the wall will be a few inches too short for it to fit. This is one of the most frustrating parts of the design process, I think! I will be mapping out the room in detail so that I can find furniture to fit. So this week, I will be narrowing down the choices of my furniture and ordering them so that they will arrive in time for my final reveal! Here is my week 3 to-do list:

• Clear out the closet (oops – this was left over from last week, but just didn’t get done)
• Prepping the walls for the paint – fixing nail holes, scrubbing, etc.
• Matching the wall color with the color we have used throughout the home – it’s a light gray – and ordering it from Lowes.
• check-circle-oPriming the walls with the primer I already have on hand.
• check-circle-oPainting the walls with the new paint color (anyone want to come and help?)
• check-circle-o Finalizing big furniture orders – measuring to make sure they fit in the room and planning out the space

One Room Challenge Week 2 Final Thoughts 

It’s been extremely hard to find time to work on my room, with all of the other stuff in life going on! I’m sure all of you can relate — kids’ practices, concerts, volunteering, and day-to-day chores. This week, my girls are on Fall break, so I become their daily entertainment. While they are 11 and 9, and would love to spend the whole day playing video games on their tablets, we will probably venture out and do some fun, Fall activities. So this will limit my time to spend on the room to here and there, and evenings when they are in bed. The challenges of motherhood and household management! Oh, and did I mention we have a new puppy too? I really wish they would offer to help me with the room, but I doubt that I will get an offer. They would love to paint, but I just don’t trust them with that job yet! Stay tuned to see paint on the wall next week!

Be sure to leave a comment below and tell me what you think of my plans and progress so far. If you’re also doing the One Room Challenge, let me know how Week 2 went for you. Then head on over to the One Room Challenge Fall 2018 blog to see all of the other Week 2 participants’ updated rooms!