A whistle stop tour!

We have officially moved in, so I thought I'd give you a quick update on the premises, now everything has gone over from the house and various storage spaces we rented or borrowed.

My studio at home is full of all the little bits and pieces I have collected over the years, which either inspire me or just decorate my studio space. It's colourful and interesting and I would say sums me up! The premises or I guess now, dots and spots HQ is plain and function'able'. It has no real bits of me there yet, other than obviously all the stuff I make.

As you walk in through the door to the right is my packaging corner - full of flat pack boxes, tape etc. Not very beautiful to look at but a very necessary element of the business!

And to the left is my 'red tube' box tower - I had to buy a large quantity of tubes to make the sums add up and make the owl posters affordable, so now all together in a tall tower, there seems an awful lot of them! The owl posters themselves are stored in the drawers under a very large spare packing table.

As you then walk further into the room to the left is my super duper 'stock' storage. All the cards I receive from the printers are then packed into boxes of 300. Up until now these were dotted around the house or with various members of the family, so now they have a place of their own. It will make stock taking so much easier from now on.

To the right lining one long wall, are my new 'Billy' shelving which house all my greetings cards - 50 designs in total. This is now my dream pick and pack area and makes life sooooo much easier.

Around the corner is my main making up table - when it's clear (unlike in the picture) I can set up lots of packs of postcards, Christmas cards etc. It will be so much better than using the dining room table at home.

This little unit has had many uses in it's time - It was bought 11 years ago, from Ikea as my daughter's first toy cupboard, then it got moved into a bathroom as a towel storage when we moved house. For the last few years it was my maths resources cupboard at school, spending the last year in the storage unit. It now is home to all my stationery bits - tape, scissors, punches etc.

On the back wall is my tape storage - you would not believe how nice it is to have it all set out - makes it so much easier to pick and pack. At home it was all hidden away in the boxes and when ever you needed tape for an order you had to keep moving boxes to get to what you needed - this will now save so much time!

This set of 'Billy shelving houses all the postcards - in their boxes as received from the printers and in their packs once made up. This is one of the first jobs I have to do as in our house I had no where to keep stock and had to make packs up to order. It will be so good to just go to the cupboard and select what a customer has ordered!

The Christmas cards used to housed at the bottom of my wardrobe and got moved to a more prominent place once the months leading up to Christmas were upon us. Now packs can be made a long time in advance and again I can keep a better eye on my stock levels.

The final area, which I would say reflects the style and ambiance of my studio, is my little coffee area. I've still to buy a kettle and am managing with flasks, which I keep forgetting to take home but I need my coffee and a secret twix tin for emergencies!!

I spent my first full day over there today - working and it was fantastic. It will take a while to find where I've put everything and get into a natural rhythm whilst packing orders but it will work! I'm sure over time I will start to bring in little bits and pieces or pin things up on the walls which will make it feel more like me, more like home! But for now it's perfect and I get my house back - which will please everyone!

I still have my studio at home and a little stock to pack last minute, small website orders. I will still do all my designing there and make up the embellished prints and personalised washing line prints and cards. Fingers crossed it will all work out fine!