|
During the initial visit, Denise explained the background story I needed to hear.
The office had been her father’s when he was alive and still had his things in it.
After his death, Denise moved in with her mom, who was having health issues and
needed her attentive care.
A consultant since 2003, Denise had mainly worked in various oil company
offices, not at home. “Prior to that, I worked for 18 years for a major Houston oil
company. In late 2005, I decided to try working from home in order to keep a closer
watch on my mom. I was tired of the commute, long hours and wanted to be my
own boss,” she says.
Denise decided to transform her dad’s home office into the functional office
of a successful geological consultant — a room in which she could focus on work
and meet clients, as well serve as a welcoming place where she could have objects
she enjoys around her and where she would actually want to spend time. The room
required very specific storage to meet her needs and a new, conveniently placed desk
space.
She wanted to keep any additional furnishing costs to a minimum in order
to invest in top-notch equipment.
“I wanted to keep Dad’s desk because it is a fixture in the room and reminds me
of him and the hours he used to spend there. Plus, it looks really good from the
living room,” she says.
An important goal of ShelterStyle.com is to capture the unique personality of every
client and incorporate his or her personality into each room. Denise is vibrant, highly
intelligent and quick to laugh. She also craves brightness, calm and orderliness — key
elements that were lacking before.
The room was dark, cluttered and full of things unrelated to its newly desired
purpose. Most of the furniture didn’t make sense for her needs, nor did it project the
image of a successful geologist. The background featured colorless white walls,
vintage family furniture, a huge hanging lamp next to a ceiling track light and a
folding metal table “desk.” There were novels on the bookshelves instead of geology
books and rock specimens. She was operating out of boxes of files on the floor. There
was a huge dollhouse, handmade by her aunt, on the floor in front of the desk. It was
pure chaos.
“The room had gradually become a mix of my things and family things. It was
disorganized and overflowing. Just walking in there would get me down. I felt I
needed to reduce the chaos and make major changes,” she explains. “And I wanted
the office to have a newness to reflect the new chapter in my career.”
It was overwhelming, and Denise was stuck. The first thing I suggested was for
her to buy Lighten Up! Free Yourself From Clutter by Michelle Passoff. It is a light
read that is guaranteed to get anybody “unstuck.”
The new office needed space to house a fax, a phone and a three-screen
computer workstation to employ the latest technology in her work. To communicate concepts, geologists draw often, and Denise needed a large magnetic
whiteboard that she could both draw on and hang geological maps.
She needed closed storage to conceal files, unattractive binders, folders, clients’ CDs and office
supplies. At the same time, she wanted the office to look nice from the living room. I suggested that placing the “working” elements along the right side of the room
would hide them from view when seated in the nearby living room.
Gently, I explained that she should proceed with emptying the room, painting it
a color she loves and reorganizing it so she could be productive. Her dad would want
her to tailor his old office to meet her needs and would wholeheartedly approve of
her decision to work at home in order to keep an eye on her mom. Since one of
Denise’s concerns was trying to blend her dad’s desk into the room, I suggested the
opposite: Let it be the unique “star” in the room and make all the other new
furnishings accent it, rather than “match” it.
THE MAKEOVER
The first step was emptying the room, taking down the curtains and the hanging lamp
and moving the dollhouse, armchair and end table out. “I liked it when you said take
these curtains down right away — today!” Denise says with a laugh. “It not only
immediately brightened the room, and my spirits, it got me started on this journey.”
When she showed me a photo of a room with blue walls that she liked, we
picked out two colors for her to paint sample poster boards. Denise likes blue
because she likes being outdoors, the color is restful and blue makes her feel good.
After painting the samples, she selected Sherwin-Williams “Frosted Denim,” # 1219.
“The color boards made me sure of the color choice before buying the paint and
helped me transition confidently from white walls to blue,” she says.
My design intern, Anya Idris, and I wrote a detailed master plan, agreeing she’d
first use Ikea’s custom office software to play around with a floor plan using their
components. She created a final AutoCAD furniture plan that Denise clearly felt
worked. |
Lost your password? | Register
