My New Sewing Table

 

Meet my NEW sewing table, designed, sized, built by my Sweetie to fit my available space.  Yahoo! It features a cut-out space so that my machine can drop-down into it, and I have a much wider space to support quilting.  Although I'm still using my clear acrylic free-motion table, the available space to support free-motion quilting is much wider.   The acrylic table fills in some of the space directly around the machine.   Nice!

As a comparison, here's the OLD set-up.  

Actually, this is an interim set-up since January 2012.  I used to have an old sewing table that I picked up off the curb in Madison about 20 years ago.  You can see it here underneath.   The surface was so bad (meaning the finish was coming off), I had to cover it with a piece of fabric all those years.  Although it had a slot where I could have dropped the machine down into it, the surface was so bad it would never allow for free-motion quilting.  In January, I decided to Get Organized, and I brought up the black desk top you see here.  This was also trash-picked many years ago with hopes of using it some day.  It turned out to be too big for my available space.   I couldn't get around it to use my Light Box, or the table to the right.  Hence, Sweetie built me a custom unit.

The adjustable medical stool is also new.  I purchased it in January from Amazon.com.  None of the local office supply places had anything that seemed sturdy enough, so I went online.    When I brought in the black desktop, it raised my sewing surface enough to make it uncomfortable.  So I bought the adjustable rolling stool.   And I wonder why I never did it sooner!   

I used to have 2 chairs in my sewing room.  1 regular kitchen table-type chair with a back, and one with the back cut off, so it was more like a stool (also trash-picked). (Now you know my dirty little secrets about recycling!)  But having 2 chairs took up too much space.  The adjustable medical stool has been a big improvement because now I only have 1 chair in my sewing room, and I can easily move it to the appropriate workstation :

1. Sewing Machine

2. Light Box

3. Work Table

4. Ironing Board

 Here's the Maker, right after installation.  Thank you, Sweetie.  I appreciate it!

 

Here's a close-up of the actual surface.  He made it out of MDF (medium-density fibrerboard) covered with a combination of 2 stains (Cherry and Walnut) plus a coat of Polyurathane.

Not a Koala Cabinet, but it's mine.  And certainly affordable by comparison. 

 

Here are some of the additional storage units I purchased, and their placement.  This also serves as an additional support space to hold up a larger quilt, should I need it.

Now I can get to my Light Box again.   And now I should be able to do some sewing projects again.  These have all kind of been on hold while my workspace has been in flux.  I guess that just makes it a good time to dye and otherwise work in the wet studio!