Cleaning Up

November was all about fixing up the new suite after the previous tenants have finally moved their stuff out. I mentioned that those tenants were a construction company, so they had sample cabinetry all over the place. Well, they had set those cabinets before redoing the floor, so that flooring all had to be repaired. Because these planks are staggered, it takes twice as much new flooring as the missing sections.

Luckily, I was able to source the same matching flooring, and began got to work I’m not a flooring expert nor do I play one on TV, so I had to YouTube some videos on how to patch vinyl flooring and got started. I didn’t do a perfect job, and there is still one section I haven’t finished, but in a few weeks the floors were looking much better.

And there was plenty of drywall to repair too. Not only the usual holes from cabinet mounting, but larger holes from cable runs, and sloppy granite installers that felt it was better to punch big holes in the wall than to trim the slab to properly fit. The wall are all knock-down textured so these larger patches had me trying my hand at that for the first time. Again, I didn’t do a perfect job, but no one but me seems to notice.

Denise is the one who likes to paint so after all the patching and molding was completed, she went to work making it all look great. Luckily we were able to perfectly match the wall color, so we didn’t have to repaint whole walls.

The front room, training room and spa room were all finally coming together by the end of November. Denise was able to start performing Raindrop treatments, and on December 11th, we hosted our spiritual center’s Sunday Service in-person as well as streaming on Zoom and Facebook Live. I’ve held Photographers Workshops, Denise has hosted some workshops herself, and I’m working to ramp up the training part of the business. Everyone who’s come by has complimented how the place looks and the positive energy.

Meanwhile, I also had to get the studio into some sort of shape so I could resume work there. If you remember the “LEGO Wall” from the old studio, well, of course I brought that to the new space, bought some additional blocks (still not quite enough) and started to separate the studio from the warehouse and shop areas.

And there was the strange case of the new outdoor signage. I designed and ordered signs which looked great, but I didn’t screw heads showing. I wanted to use French cleats like I did with the stainless steal sign I had at the old place. Well, the French cleats were aluminum and the signs backing had this heavy vinyl coating. I tried several different adhesives before I was able to find a mounting solution. Now I know how many different industrial adhesives that will not bond to vinyl.

There’s still a lot to be done to make the new studio into the clean, inviting, and highly functional workspace I want it to be, but I’ll keep sharing as the work continues. Right now it’s fully functional and I’ve been shooting again. It feels great to be getting back to the photography that I love.