Shopping for office furniture is about as exciting as watching yoga as an Olympic sport. For whatever reason the chain office supply stores take me back to the stale, depressing halls of my elementary school and the products they sell are just as exciting. From what I've seen office furniture can go two ways..from the heavy, dark, tufted leather chair for the big ass ambulance chasing attorney to the cheaply designed, nearly impossible to build Ikea crapola for the strung out, broke writer. There's rarely anything in-between, so as I attack the project of designing an office space for two busy entrepreneurs this week, I've been thinking outside the store bought box and into the box stores like Home Depot and Lowe's for creative, inexpensive organizational ideas. To maximize storage space while creating a minimalist desk, I bought a standard door at Home Depot and two 30" bookshelves (perfect size in height and width for a desk). I primed and painted the three pieces in the same palette and for a pop of color added left over wallpaper pieces to the back of the shelving units. Secure everything together with L brackets (mounted on the inside of the desk to the back of the shelves and bottom of door to keep hidden) and in a few short hours these unlikely pieces come together to create a perfect workspace!
QUICK TIP: To add two fun conversation pieces to this desktop, I used magnetic paint and chalkboard paint in the corners. The chalkboard paint square (not the entire desk, just a 2'x2' square) is perfect for quick notes instead of the traditional post-its and the magnetic paint in a great landing spot for paper clips and other magnetic items!
