03/23/2026
I closed my 3,000 square foot studio space in 2019 because I was told that customers were not allowed in my store because of social distancing. In March I was given a written notice from the bazaars office at the courthouse saying that if customers entered my facility I would be fined a $1,000 per day, with 24 hours in jail, and I would not be able to renew my business license for 10 years. It didn't make sense to pay rent to the plaza when customers couldn't buy stuff. My landlord begged me to stay, but under the circumstance, I let the lease expire and moved my art studio to the attic of my house. It was a blessing in disguise because now it means my overhead is way less. Shifting the business online made my numbers work better.
The problem with that is I had 3,000 square feet of stuff. My attic looks like tetris and it's a big room. This year I made it my mission to declutter my entire house and business. So far I'm almost all the way done, and now my house is practically empty. The rooms are looking like magazine pictures. Today it was raining so I decided to do the last corner of the art studio. It is still pretty tetresy up there but now it's a better functioning working space.
During this process today I noticed something... I have this big habit of buying art supplies. I made an agreement with myself that I am not allowed to buy any more art supplies or items for the business until I have used the current supplies that are in the room. If I do that by next year I think I can have 2/3 of the items in that room cleared out. Their is a library of fabric that needs new identities.