Doctors need their offices and architects need their studios. Retailers need their stores and sales people need their cubicles. So, why shouldn't crafters have a place of their own to work? If every nook and cranny in your home is filled with various stages of craft projects, it may be time to turn your spare bedroom into a craft room. Craft rooms not only offer a dedicated place to work -- a glorious place where you don't have to clean up a project every time you step away -- but they also offer a single place to store and organize all of your tools of the trade. No more grabbing scissors from the kitchen, paper from the office and glue from the basement so that by the time you sit down at the dining room table, inspiration has gone right out the window.

As with any workspace, having the right furniture makes all the difference in getting work done.

The needs of a craft room are pretty simple:

·         Crafters need a place to work and a place to store their stuff. The worktable is perhaps the single most important piece of furniture. You'll want something with an ample table surface and a height that keeps you comfortable during long stretches of gluing and stitching. A drafting table that can rotate and angle is a good choice.

·         A good chair is also a sound investment. Drafting chairs, which look like the giraffe version of a regular office chair, are good choices because they offer the comfort and wheels of a cushioned office chair with the height of a stool.

·         You'll need good lighting -- a combination of an ambient overhead light along with task lights at each station.

·         And of course, ample shelving is a must. Modular cubbies along with a combination of wall shelves and freestanding shelving units should offer enough options to find a place for just about everything.

The key to regular crafting is to have everything ready to go when inspiration strikes. Organization only actually works if you make it a habit to put things back after you're done using them. Creating a dedicated place for everything is helpful for getting into this habit.

·         Come up with an organizational system that makes sense to you. You can organize by item, by alphabet or by colour -- whatever gets your creative juices flowing and makes things easy to find.

·         Clear plastic boxes that fit on shelves are great for storing larger items like spools of yarn and sheets of felt

·         Smaller glass jars are ideal for stashing notions, like buttons and needles. Not only will this make them easy to locate, but the wide range of colours will also add a decorative element.

·         A pegboard hung on the wall is perfect for hanging tools in plain sight that you use regularly, like your scissors and glue gun. You can even outline them to remind yourself what goes on that hook.

·         A large bulletin board is a must as an inspiration board to hang magazine pages or fabric swatches for visions of future projects.