Sustainable materials bedroom, a diy adventure

An artist's home studio is both refuge and inspiration. Since moving into my new home I've busied myself suiting it out. I loathe buying new things and love tinkering with my hands, so I've scavenged materials and prototyped for hours. 

Here's my favorite so far, inspired by this amazing outdoor vertical garden project in San Paulo. I found a torn couch cover in our free box. I had already gromited webbing to the wall, no easy task on the old angled drywalls. I cut and sewed pouches, keeping the original seams on the lip, and sewed them to the webbing with a found spool of fishing line.

I'm still experimenting with the sag that pulls the webbing toward the center -- the couch cover had some straps attached so I might add another row using those. I'm thinking about adding one more on the bottom for a heavy pot. For now, I'm waiting for wildflowers to sprout from seed. Friends will be contributing more plants and I'll be scavenging fir bark for orchids next!

At first I made pouches too deep to monitor the pots easily, then too shallow except for the narrowest water bottles. 

Finally I settled on this 1/3 fold, still using the original seams for the long edges. 

I know garden soil isn't the best for indoor potting, but I'm experimenting with drainage and minimal watering for the moment.

Next is the "closet" rod corner. I literally picked up the telescoping white metal rod from the curb after a house cleaning. I'm banking on the molding holding most of the weight, with a few screws in studs to keep it from rolling away from the walls. The lower wood rod was much more difficult. Without studs anywhere near the work area I had to use L-braces and plan on hanging only small, light things there.

By the way, molly anchors did not play nice with this wall. It's entirely possible I estimated wrong on the wall thickness, but it was not smooth tinkering. In the end I stuck with wood screws. 

Speaking of which, I scavenged wood scraps and learned to use the saw angle tool to assemble (unassemble, adjust, and reassemble) this pedestal table. It's a bit wobbly, but the perfect height for me to work on the laptop without discomfort! Whew, it was a challenge and now I check out every piece of wood furniture with interest.

Next update: acoustic panels and piano homecoming.