ReadyMade’s friend and sometime contributor, illustrator Mike Perry, has recently outgrown his current studio. When we ran into him at a party a few weeks back, he said he was getting ready to move with his office-mates into a new space in the same building in Crown Heights, Brooklyn—and that they were going to do it right this time, design-wise. Cheap and easy, but well-planned and good-looking. Intrigued, we asked Mike to document the build-out process on his new dream workspace…and he agreed! Look out this week and next for posts tracking their progress. And if all goes well, we may even plan a little New York ReadyMade soiree in Mike’s new office.—Ed.
Monday, August 18.
Anna Wolf, Jim Datz, & I (Mike Perry) have been working feverishly in our current studio for the last two years. When we decided recently to move into a new space, we knew we wanted to do it right. We wanted to take advantage of all the knowledge we had acquired in the past and do our best to perfect our future home. We decided to stay in our wonderful solar-powered green building in Crown Heights Brooklyn called Big Sue but to move from #102 to #308.
Big Sue, or the Monti Building, has been around for over 200 years. It has been a Budweiser Brewery, Monti Moving and Storage, and today it is filled with all kinds of artists and craftsmen.
The Team
J Bell
From: Albuquerque, NM
Occupation: Architect
Years in business: 3
Main objective for new studio space: “To design & build—utilizing everyday materials—something that is: suitable for the moment; flexible for tomorrow; adaptable for the future.”
Anna Wolf
From: Santa Monica, CA
Occupation: Photographer
Years in business: 6
Main objective for new studio space: “My main goal is to have an overall more organized and visually cleaner space. For myself I would really love to give all of my photo gear a proper home. Right now it’s thrown together on a huge baker’s rack but never stays organized.”
Mike Perry
From: Kansas City
Occupation: Maker
Years in business: 7
Main objective for new studio space: To feel happy, comfortable, and productive.
Jim Datz
From: Brooklyn via Philadelphia via South Jersey
Years in business: (career-wise = 12 years) (neither fish nor fowl = 3 years)
Occupation: This month it’s 60% Illustration / 25% Graphic Design / 15% Art Direction
Main objective for new studio space:
“1. Survive moving 60 book boxes and assorted career detritus.
2. Build a bright, open, super functional, inspiring place in which to make (and display) beautiful things with collaborators friends & visitors.
3. This might sound ridiculously optimistic, but I honestly believe that a space within which interesting things can be dreamed up, talked about, debated, challenged, manufactured, shared, taught and sold becomes a cultural condensation point in the city. And the by-product of that collective creative activity is a momentum that carries everyone forward together.”
Read about our first day of work after the jump.
Day One: Layout Lunacy
So: we’re an operation of three artists, one studio manager and three interns. At this point, we’ve gone through tons of iterations on how to lay out our new studio space. We need three main desks, one desk for the studio assistant, and 2-3 more desks for interns that flow in and out of the studio throughout the months. And an organized system for dealing with all of the stuff you need to have around but don’t want to constantly look at.
We’ve been drawing a lot of pictures to help us visualize different layouts.
So far, in addition to planning everything out, we’ve made three trips to the hardware store. We designed our desk system right there at the Lowe’s, using basic supplies, because we wanted something that would be modular and simple and cheap.
We built a test desk in the store just so we could be sure it worked. We’ll definitely give you more desk details as we progress.
The car was not happy with 100 pounds of door. Our hands were dusty, but intact!
This is such a great and timely post for me. My fiance and I are building out our home studio and we’ve been debating whether or not our desk/work tables should made or bought… this simple home depot design is brilliant and soothing on the eye. Thank you so much! I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the posts!
I want to come help! And, can’t wait for the 1st studio party!
it would be rad if there was an easy way to get 4″ or 5″ casters to screw into the bottom posts.
Amazing that you were able to test out your ideas right there in the store. Did they mind? Definitely look forward to hearing what happened with the tables and how they were built and, of course, the party! ha!
[...] Mike Perry reports this week on the progress he and his office mates are making building out their new workspace in Brooklyn. See the first installment here. [...]
The Home Depot that I frequent is cool with in-store mock ups, which is one of the reasons I go there. It’s always good to do as much as you can in the store so that you can take home 95% of the right parts on your first trip. :)
Tom, thanks for the info. Good to know that they are cool with the tests. Yes, good to try and get it right the first time! However, I’m a little concerned that on the last update Mike Perry said he had been to the hardware store seven times since starting the project. Mike, what’s up? Are the in store mock-ups not working or what?
yes luv the desk, & the dreamy studio manifesto.
[...] progress they are making building out their new workspace in Brooklyn. See the first installment here and the second [...]
[...] guys, Check out Anna and her friends at ReadyMade Magazine. Their moving studios and setting up a new shop. You can follow their progression and watch the new [...]
[...] progress they are making building out their new workspace in Brooklyn. See the first installment here, the second here, and the third [...]
Just wanted to clarify that we actually were at Lowe’s to do the desk mock-up. While Home Depot is massive and has tons of stuff, we have been finding that Lowe’s is better organized, better stocked, and the staff is much nicer and more helpful! I’m going to change the post because I can’t bare to give Home Depot the credit!!
[...] progress they are making building out their new workspace in Brooklyn. See their dispatches from Day One, Day Two, Day Three, and Days Four and [...]
[...] live on the process of building out their new workspace in Brooklyn. See their dispatches from Day One, Day Two, Day Three, Days Four and Five, and Days Six Thru Eight. [...]
[...] cosiddetta Mid-Century Culture con cui Datz collabora spesso (con alcuni divide lo studio che hanno costruito insieme) e che contribuiscono a creare uno stile famigliare e riconoscibile. Singolare e di fortissimo [...]
we built a pipe desk for our son when he was small; it’s great because you can just replace the pipes to make it taller when necessary.