5th annual Where Bloggers Create party ~ Boxwood Cottage Studio 2013

Prolog: This is a long post with over 30 photos so you better grab a cup of tea or or a mug of coffee and make yourself comfy now ;-)

Welcome back to Boxwood Cottage Studio dear blogging friends and readers - new and old - and to the 5th annual Where bloggers create party hosted by Karen Valentine of My Desert Cottage blog - see her event button in my right side bar. It's also my 5th time to participate and every year when Karen announces the party date being in the middle of July I think oh no I won't make it this time, there is so much to do in the garden right now and it's too warm up there in my attic studio under the roof top. But alas I did it again since the weather wasn't really hot this summer until now and I started by making space to create a new corner and studio vignettes, as always vintage inspired which means I mix up vintage flea- and antique market finds with new modern furniture mostly from Ikea. I brought my willow day bed from my studio down in the garden where I also created a new garden corner with it. In Germany there is saying "2 Fliegen mit einer Klappe schlagen", means with just one change I made two spaces better which I just love! So now you want to see it and I'm going to start by showing you my new favorite studio corner and then all the cleaned up and rearragend rest of my studio. The garden will have to wait until my next post though.

In that corner under the pitch of the roof I had my daybed before which I didn't really use there apart from putting stuff on it when I created. Now I got my white Alex drawers from Ikea out of a hidden dark studio corner where it was before and put it there under the pitch of the roof and I instantly loved it there, where it is reachable so much better when I sit on that vintage chair at my studio table and create. The drawers are all filled with papers like vintage wall paper and sheet music paper which I often need in my creations.

 See the blue evening sky in the picture above? That is the best thing about my my studio that I have 3 huge double attic windows up there giving me lot's of natural light.

 I also put my vintage suitcase collection there under one of the windows and I really like them there better as in the corner I hade them before. They are mostly filled with Christmas decorations.

 Above is a close up of my Alex with a vintage typrewriter (old time writing) vignette on top and my black chalkboard (ex kitchen cupboard door) behind it.

 The clipboard is one of the London finds from my vacation there last month and I typed and printed out a reading chart to clip on it.

Following is a close up of the vignette on the small Lack table beside of Alex. There is my stamp caroussel for example and a vintage shoe last ( my paternal grand father was a shoemaker) and you can also spot the paper maché pumpkins lying in the white drawer which are waiting to get painted for some autumnal vignettes soon.

 Here is a close up of my vintage flea market find suitcases, some are old leather others are coated cardboard. Of course I had to put one of my vintage black top hats on top of the stack:

 Not to forget a close up of my favorite suitcase I got a few years ago in a friendship swap with Ann Perry of the Tin Rabbit in Texas. I simply love how Ann decorated the inside of the suitcase:

And in case you'd like to see it I also took a close up of the vintage black typewriter vignette (this is one of 3 vintage travel typewriters that I own).

 After the close up above here is a wider view of that corner with the table I use to create at:

And another close up of some of my old scissors which I'm especially fond of, sitting in a vintage glass flower frog. The soldered domed glass pendant you might also spot there I made for my oncle recently and it's filled with pictures of my auntie which passed away not too long ago and her wedding ring also fitted between the two domed glasses:

From here we move a bit farther to the right under the next rooftop window where I have one of my Expedit shelves for studio storage and an old black train light as well as an old black telephone ( yes I adore old/vintage black things!) :

Let's have a closer look at the shelf now. In the left wire basket I store my collection of vintage postcards and cabinet cards:

Here comes a wider view of this area where you'll also see part of my comfy old studio sofa and my laptop on which I type this right now:

 followed by an even wider view of one half of my studio:

In this area I have another Expedit shelf which my faithful blogging friends and readers will sure remember from older blog posts:

This area also is a bit more colorful and contains part of my collection of vintage sewing machines

as well as my aqua colored Räskog supply cart who quickly became my most important studio helper who is always handy and in reach:

On the opposite side of this studio shelf are two of my studio desks and another one in the left hand corner under the window which is my soldering table. As you might have guessed I also love to hang pretty things from the wooden beams at my studio ceiling like the vintage inspired umbrella, the honeycomp paper ball or the huge wooden scissors:

 You might have also observed by now that I'm no minimalist, by no means really ha ha. I love eye candy and I need most of my pretty things displayed around me for my viewing pleasure and inspiration:

The white painted printers tray I moved from the corner unter the pitch of my roof top over to this wooden Ikea desk and I like it much better here right now. This time I also cleaned up the space under my desk especially for Alexandra ;-) In the wooden tray on top of the vintage travel suitcase under the desk I store my jewelry making stuff and the suitcase is filled with paper maché boxes:

I can easily move the white tray away if I should need more space on top of the desk:

The washi tape holder stands on the desk shelf and under it is one of my recent creations a soldered bug in an old book under glass - inspired my idol Sally Jean Aleander:

 

 At the left side of this desk stands my vintage spinning wheel on top of another small Expedit shelf:

and farther left is this attic window of the north house side over my soldering desk. Since I love birds and everything about them I also have a bird/nest garland hanging in the studio window and a bird cage hanging from the ceiling. The glittered nest garland is one of my treasured garlands from my talented friend Madai of Butterfly cottage in Florida. The vintage postcard fabric banner is a creation of my friend Anita who sews the most beautiful things.

 Off for a little a break .... no just joking  can't leave you now ;-)

 I like how I can see the huge scissors in the studio mirror reflection seen above :)

This vignette stands on a tiny set of  drawers which sits on my glass desk and shows some of my soldered shadow boxes. You can right click and superzise all of my photos btw if you'd like to see even more details. I also have a collection of vintage rulers displayed here in an old milk jug:

 Sweet Charlotte - a creation of my long time blogging friends Jenny and Aaron from Everyday is a holiday blog - is peeking from behind the boxes :)

Phew this is a long post but don't fear you almost made it through it, because this is the last studio wall/corner that I want to share with you today

As the top hat addict that I am of course my studio dolls get little top hats too :)

In the last photo above is my framed collage of waxed nature finds which I created in my sisters atelier last fall.

Well I think that I should better stop here for today because there are so many more awesome studios out there in blogland waiting for you to get discovered at this great inspirational party. I'd like to thank Karen for hosting it again and everyone of you who made it until here and I would love to hear from you so that I can visit you back.

xoxo~ Carola

I'm sharing this with he following parties:

Knick of Time Tuesday - see button in my right side bar
Blissful Whites Wednesday at Timewashed blog - see button in my left side bar
What's it Wednesday at Ivy and the Elephants
Inspiration Friday at Common Ground blog