Teach Soap

Our house is kind of small, only 3 bedrooms. The kids share a room right now, and the third is the guest room and my office where I do computer work and store all of my supplies and finished products. But my daughter is getting older, and I'm thinking I'll have to give that space up to her sooner than later.

We have this odd room- it's a 3 season sun room that was added on to our house in probably the 60's that links the house with the garage. We mostly use it for storage, though, because it's not insulated and we don't want to heat it in the winter or cool it in the summer. But it's a good sized room- probably around 15x15. Big waste of space, but we haven't had the time, desire, or resources to do anything about it, and honestly weren't sure WHAT to do. So I'm thinking we could insulate it and it could be my new office/work space (most of my working takes place in the kitchen at the moment, but that is such a mess, and there is never enough counter space for everything that is going on).

I know I want at least 1 counter height table. And a heat source (something as simple as a hot plate) to melt oils. A sink would be nice, but I don't know if that's doable. And lots of shelves for storage. If you had that kind of space, what would you want to include? It would be SOOO nice to have a separate work space, so that if I'm in the middle of working on something and need to pause to cook a meal I can just leave it, go into the kitchen and cook, and them come back and pick up where I left off instead of having to MOVE everything.

I love my microwave! Ventilation and a fan. Make sure you have easily accessible outlets for your crockpot, scale, stick blender, etc. More curing racks than you think you need because you will fill them! Lots of shelves because your soap making ingredients multiply when you aren't looking. Lots of counter space. Stacking plastic containers for all those wonderful, cured soaps. Wouldn't a refrigerator be nice? OK, that could be expensive but it would be nice. It will be fun to see what everyone thinks. Good luck!

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Linda

I learn so much when I can't leave well enough alone!

Make sure you have electricity -- then you can do a space heater in the winter and a fan in the summer!

IKEA has shelves for as little as $49.

I would probably find inexpensive quilted or fleece material in a pretty pattern and make a pocket at the top to hold a pvc irrigation pipe (poor man's curtain rod!) and put those up along the exterior walls. You can cut "window flaps" in them for light and hold those flaps up with velcro, but it would help insulate the space.

I would buy some solid wood doors whatever width you want your counter and underneath would go a cabinet from stock merchandise at the Home Depot/Lowe's. If you use two doors, you would need 3 cabinets. Under this space would be storage -- shelving, boxes, etc As you can afford more cabinets, then it would have more cabinets. Both sides of the room could be done this way and you'd have a ton of counter space. You could even put an under counter refrigerator in this space.

On one end I would put the curtains inwards a bit and have storage for some of the stuff you have already stored in the room. In front of that curtain would go two file cabinets with another door on it for my desk.

If it is possible to suspend anything from the ceiling -- I would get inexpensive florescent shop lights and spray paint them a color you like using Rustoleum heat resistant spray paint. You could then have alot of light at night.

Have fun recreating the space!

Wow you guys- lots of great (and thrifty!) ideas! I love the doors as countertops thing- I'm wondering how hard it would be to find doors that are both solid and flat, without buying them new... or could I use doors with insets and put plexi over them? Somehow I don't see that going well with soaping... wouldn't spilled lye heavy soap or fragrance oil damage the plexi? But definititely good ideas.

The quilt ideas (lining the walls) would be fine... except we live in MN. I'm pretty sure the winter would laugh at us if we tried to insulate that way. Plus, half the issue is the lack of insulation in the walls, the other half is the lack in the ceiling and the fact that the crawl space is shared with the garage. I don't think there's any way to get around gutting and insulating, although I'm hoping we can just blow in insulation to the crawl space above without having to build some sort of separation between it and the garage crawlspace. I'm not that concerned with gutting- the walls are this awful knotty pine car siding (I know, some people love that, I kind of despise it), and it's not a job I'm unprepared to do. I've gutted plaster and lathe before, it has got to be easier than that.

But I'm totally loving the storage suggestions! I'm really excited about the potential of the room. We can DIY pretty much all of it except the outlets- there are already two in there, but I'm thinking I would want more. And my husband has added outlets before, but he may not want to do that big of a job. I'm thinking I'll put a counter height table in the middle of the room (I hate wasted floor space) and along one wall, and have most of the rest be shelves for storing soaps and ingredients. There's also a couch in there, though, and I don't really want to get rid of it.

I love brainstorming... don't so much love the actual doing of remodeling projects:)

I thought it was a glass type enclosure. Didn't realize there were solid walls. Definitely should rip down the pine panelling and insulate with batts. I think you could easily blow insulation into the crawl space. Put some more outlets in before drywall.

I would also want a desk or some area to sit and access the internet (more wiring before drywall goes up). I have dreamed of having a special soapmaking, scrapbooking, sewing, knitting area in my home. I am just a little jealous but also delighted for you!

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Susie
Sometimes A Mistake is so much fun, You just have to do it again!

I don't need to wire for internet, we have wireless, but a desk is a definite must. And it will heavily impact the design of the room, because I don't like a desk that faces a wall.

Yeah, I didn't thinking about explaining the sun room bit. It does have a lot of windows- three on the west and east side (so the room has great light, too), but around the windows (the aren't floor to ceiling, or even wall to wall) would need insulating, and the South wall because it is shared with the garage. The other wall is shared with the house and wouldn't really need to be insulated. And of course the ceiling.

This will also house all my other hobbies and their materials- my sewing machine, my ridiculous yarn and fabric stashes. I even started leather crafting a few weeks ago. Last night I was thinking about the amount of money I could have saved by NOT buying all the random craft supplies I have laying around my house. But what fun would that be? That's kind of why I started selling online- to fund my obsessions!

I actually can't believe it took me this long to decide to do this. We've been trying to figure out what to do with this room since we moved in... I think I needed the motivation of my daughter showing signs of needing her own room.

OK so I revise my suggestions just a bit --

Door top desk in the middle of the room, leaving room all the way around it for walk room. With this, you could put several file cabinets or cabinets on each end facing out and still have room underneath for your feet.

If the windows are next to each other, then door counters with storage (as described previously) go under the windows (or in front of them).

In between the windows or next to them would be shelves up the wall.

If there is no wall space on the window walls, then I would put my shelves against the end walls with more shelves up against them but perpendicular to them with the least amount of space in between that was necessary to get to the shelves and put stuff on/take stuff off of them. I hope that describes it so you can picture it.

No matter how you do it, it's going to cost money for insulation, dry wall, doors/counters, and shelves. If you don't have doors to use, you can buy straight counters from Home Depot in formica . . . and then use whatever desk you have for the center.

Keep us posted on whatever you do!

Jill

Yes, keep us posted. As always, we want pictures!

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Linda

I learn so much when I can't leave well enough alone!