About half of the country is still trying to find a comfortable place to work at home in. While some people have dedicated office space in their homes, none of us were prepared to have everyone needing to use it at the same time!
Let’s look at a couple of ways that I set up simple, affordable work spaces in my home.
I hope your kitchen table doesn’t look like this. If it does, read on and we’ll make it better.
I have a nice size office here at Casa DeCocco, but suddenly had to share the space when Hub’s office sent everyone home. At the same time, Grandboy’s bedroom became his high school classroom. We all thought it was a short-term adventure.
We were wrong about that, weren’t we?
Since I was in the midst of transitioning from interior design to writing (more about that another day), I decided to to move DeCocco Design downstairs to the kitchen table. It looks out a big bay window, so the view is lovely. I can even work outside on the screened porch when it’s warm enough. Loved it! For a while.
When working on the screened porch, visitors tend to be respectful and very, very quiet.
Being at the Kitchen table let me wander in any direction my pandemic brain wanted.
However, It turns out that my mind, during a pandemic, needs more structure than I thought. A lot more structure.
I’m very visual. Being in a Kitchen is great for reading cookbooks, perfecting my sourdough bread (sourdough cinnamon raisin anyone? it’s divine), stuffing Kongs with treats to keep in the freezer for the dog, hearing the dryer turning off and running to fold and put away warm clothes …
OH MY GOD! Working at the Kitchen table was awful! No consistent work was getting done. I didn’t realize that I need the physical cues of a real desk in a designated space to settle down and get to work!
But my desk was now in an office occupied by a man who is often on Zoom calls. That’s too noisy. A desk in another part of the house was needed. But where?
So much to see! So much to do! I can’t focus!
I turned to Wayfair. Yes, I’m slowly but surely becoming a Wayfair shopper. If you carefully read the descriptions and reviews, you can do pretty well on that site. Since I was still thinking this was going to be very temporary, I wanted an inexpensive desk that would transition to another role in the near future.
This is what I found: and where I put it:
This is the Lowell wood console table. It’s a cross between a console table and a desk.
You can’t see them well in my photo, but there are 2 useful drawers in the front. The color I chose was antique washed gray. I tucked it right into a bay window in what many people call the Dining Room (we’ve never used it that way). It looks out at the front garden. Since the desk is only 52” wide, It’s a great fit.
Then I grabbed one of our mcm dining chairs out of the upstairs office, added some plants that love that bright window and I had a great spot to write in.
The bonus of having my desk in this window is that the light is usually excellent for Zoom calls.
When the sun gets right in front of the window, I’ve added a white solar shade that filters it well. I pulled it down a bit when I took the picture so you can see it, but it’s usually rolled all the way up. Solar shades are a favorite of mine.
Next:
We also put a desk in Grandboy’s room as taking virtual classes on his bed was NOT working out. Found online at National Business Furniture, it’s called the Harrogate. It has one drawer and one open cubby in the front. Plenty of storage for this virtual student.
The desk comes with white metal legs or black ones. I chose white because he’s got a black bed, a dark dresser and dark bamboo shades. That’s enough dark furniture. White accents coordinate with the white moldings in the room and contrast well against those gorgeous green walls.
Let’s talk about desk chairs: the one I used is from Thrifty Office Furniture in Raleigh. It’s fantastic. Everyone at my Hub’s corporate office has one - they’re a big hit. Very comfortable to sit in all day and very sturdy.
No matter where you live - although it probably has to be in the U.S. - you can get one by calling Thrifty’s Sales Manager, Suzanne Perry. Here’s her email: suzanneperry@thriftyofficefurniture.com.
Everyone struggles with finding a good desk chair at a reasonable price for home offices. Look no further, this is your chair. I’m making it easy for you and you’re welcome.
It’s called the 4008 Cinch desk chair. Suzanne will give you a great price. With tax, we paid under $300 and picked it up ourselves.
Since the picture was taken of the desk in Grandboy’s room, I’ve also added a chair pad on the rug. Please always use a chair pad. The wheels will tear up your carpet fairly quickly. Here’s a good one from Office Depot:
Your mat probably needs to be at least 3’ x 4’ and choose one specifically for the type of floor your chair sits on. This one is for a medium pile carpet. I don’t think you’re going to find a decent one for less than $50. They don’t last forever but are much cheaper than replacing your wall to wall carpeting! I’ve seen some mats made of tempered glass that look intriguing.
A photo note: Grandboy is 15. He does not take kindly to me taking pictures in his room, hence the not-so-great photo. He also will not let me put anything attractive on his walls. He likes the green color (so do I - Sherwin’s Reseda Green) and he likes empty walls.
I digitally added that guitar hanging on the wall. You’re probably looking at it and thinking “take that fake guitar off the wall.” It makes me happy so it’s staying.
I know, this isn’t really making my case. Let’s move on.
Now all you need is a light fixture for whatever desk. you use in any room. Don’t live by the glow of the computer screen.
If you go back up to my desk in the bay window, you’ll see that I put a small floor lamp next to the desk. That window gives amazing light all day long. I really want to discourage myself from sitting at the desk in the evening, so that floor lamp is enough to work at the laptop, but not to do much more.
For Grandboy’s desk, he has a regular table lamp that gives enough light to work at any time. Desk lamps should be smaller than table lamps and they need to focus the light on the desk.
Here’s a desk lamp that would work well in a small work from home space:
This is Colby. LED, usb port and a touch base! Who doesn’t love a touch base? And the neck has an adjustment option.
Of course, you can use a small-ish table lamp on a desk too. It’s just that regular lampshades are made for a consistent spread of light all around the lamp. On a desk, we usually want to direct the light to a certain area, so a closed shade does that.
I hope this helps. If you’ve tried some little tricks to fit in a functional desk in your home, let me know about them. We’re all making a lot of adjustments in 2020 and some of them are working out just fine!
With sparkle and texture,
Anne