Before and After: Closet Home Office

Leaving my large home office behind in St. John's wasn't easy, especially since I was moving my workstation into a room that was meant for a storage closet. As you have heard 1 million times, our apartment is TINY! And my office is no different. It's 5'x7' with no natural light, but it's one of the reasons this apartment was so appealing. 

Typically in the rental world, things like installing cabinetry on the wall is usually looked down upon. Thankfully, our landlord gave us permission to add a bit of much needed cabinet space above the desk. 

I was hell bent on having a standing work desk when we moved up here. I found the manual crank legs at Ikea, but instead of buying them with the intended desk surface, I used a grey laminate counter top I liked better instead. Because the only space for my hard drives was below the desk though, the desk usually stays at standing height. I added a stool so I could switch from sitting and standing throughout the day. More on my experience with this to come!

With the desk at standing height, the monitor was a little low, so I built this stand to jack my monitor up to eye level. You can find the full tutorial to this project here.

Since the only source of light in this room was one tit light on the ceiling, I decided a strip of LEDs would work nicely behind the desk to balance out the brightness from the monitor. I also hung a rope light above the desk which I attached to the bottom of the cabinet with a 3M hook.

I fell in love with these prints from Walrus; this one in particular since it has Atlantic sea animals on it. Below, I hung three plastic shoe shelves on the wall. The top two bins store actual shoes; the bottom stores camera accessories.

Greenery was a must in this tiny little space. I found a plant that preferred darkness and little water, which was PERFECT for me since I tend to forget about watering these guys.

If you follow us on Facebook and Instagram, you already know that I have recently moved my work situation to the living room. I did this for two reasons. The first and main reason was the lack of natural light was slowly making me depressed. It's really hard to sit in a hot, dark closet for 9-12 hours a day and be productive. I wanted some light, damn it! The second reason was with the computer and all the hard drives creating heat, the office was like a sauna. Our apartment is unusually hot anyway, but I just couldn't take it anymore. 

Overall the move has been great so far, though I do miss having everything organized and tucked away in my real office! 

Disclosure: Product of our choice was supplied by SAM Design for this project. By purchasing through our affiliate links, you are directly supporting our blog and the businesses that allow us to make this apartment happen. So thank you!