You know by now that we are good at keeping secrets... and we've been keeping another one!

Welcome to PART 1 of our

NEW OFFICE MAKEOVER series! 

We've been looking for our perfect studio / office space for years. With Dixi having had a rented office space for six plus years now, we have a pretty good idea of exactly what things we need, the things we want, and things we absolutely don't want. So finding something right was always going to be a big ask.

Then we saw this space become available with our agents, and as cliché as it sounds... from that first viewing it felt like a place we could make really special. 

Our first viewing, May 2022

A lot of things about this office space were all the things we DIDN'T like :') horrible corporate blue carpets (if you've ever been in a typical British office YOU KNOW), a really weird layout that took up space where it didn't need to, badly thought out kitchen and bathroom, magnolia walls, and just generally cheap and nasty finishings.

But at the foundations there were SO many things we loved:
Plenty of floor space, especially if we pulled down walls and rethought the layout.
High ceilings (and we immediately had ideas about a mezzanine and extra storage).
Huge windows and lots of light, perfect for photography.
Good location and not far from where we were based already and even closer to a park we love to walk through.
Self-contained with its own entrance.

Amy didn't wait long to put in an offer... and we were SO excited to get it accepted! Unfortunately at that time, there was still a business in there who had a lease that didn't end for a few months.

Fine, we thought. Let's make the most of this time. Get ideas together, think about the budget, speak to local builders about the project. 

And then... Autumn 2022

It wouldn't be a building makeover project without some curveballs. Some big, inconvenient, expensive curveballs :')

We walked by the office one day and glanced through the windows. By now the previous tenants had moved most of their things out, but still had time on their lease. We were sure we could see something black on the ceiling. Uh oh. Got in touch with the agents, who got in touch with the current owner, who investigated... the upstairs flat had a leak and hadn't told anyone.

Our ceiling was caving in, the wood rotting, and water was dripping down the walls and into our kitchen and bathroom. I mean... we wanted to completely redo the space. But this added months onto the project. Thankfully no extra expense on our end (we hadn't exchanged contracts yet) but it was still a huge dent in our timeline to get this going.

Because we know so many of you are just like us, we know you'll probably be interested to see how this project has been playing out! We'll post some other progress updates here, and we'll mainly be posting our Office Makeover Diaries on our Instagram so make sure to follow and let us know what you think.

We've learnt a lot, and we are excited to share!