Creating a work space in your living room

When I started the blog in 2020 I quickly realised I was going to need a space of my own to work. We do have a small office in our home. Tony and I have a surveying business and he works from home a lot at night and has used the office for a long time. We did try and set things up so that we could share the space. However, let’s just say we have different attitudes to organisation🤣. After considering my options I decided the best place for me to set up would be the living room.

CHOOSING THE RIGHT SPACE FOR CREATING A WORK SPACE IN YOUR LIVING ROOM

The things I needed from the space:-

• a desk to hold my laptop, close to a power source;
• drawers to hold paperwork and other essentials. I had space in our office to store folders relating to the administration of our business as well as the blog. This meant that I didn’t need to cater for this in my own office space;
• a comfortable chair for long stints on the computer. This chair would also need to look good because it would be in our living room;
• I didn’t want the desk space to impede movement through our living area.

After considering all of the above I decided the ideal place for my desk would be behind one of our living room sofas. There was power available under the corner table that could be used for my laptop. I did have to push the sofas forward so that we could still move around the area but it didn’t cramp the space at all.

SETTING UP YOUR SPACE

We had a table in our spare room that had two drawers. It was large enough to hold my computer and also provide room for a few decorative items. The only problem was that it wasn’t quite high enough to sit under it comfortably. To fix this problem we purchased 4 casters which gave it the additional height.

Next up was the chair. I had an old chair of my great aunts in the garage. It wasn’t overly comfortable because it had very old wadding on it. The solution was a quick makeover including some new upholstery.

As our living room already had a lot of timber furniture I felt that it was necessary to lighten the space by painting the chair white.

To make the chair cushion I purchased some foam. Traced the seat base on it and then cut the size out. I used an electric knife and it worked a treat. I then covered the foam with a soft wadding and stapled it to the timber base with a staple gun.

As we have some grey fabric chairs in the living room I decided to use some light grey linen to cover the chair cushion. This is the finished product.

THE FINISHING TOUCHES WHEN CREATING A WORK SPACE IN YOUR LIVING ROOM

Once we had the desk and chair finished we put them in the new space. I couldn’t be happier. Not only does it fit perfectly and look great in the space, I can see outside to the backyard which is really lovely.

I hope you enjoyed seeing how I was able to find some space for myself in our home without spending much money. Having this desk has made getting my work done much easier and definitely a lot more pleasant.

You can see my master bedroom makeover here.