Another day, another craft room! Sue Runyon of Sue Runyon Designs has a fantastic studio space dedicated entirely to her craft.  Keeping her space immaculate, organized and bright obviously reflects in the beautiful works of art she creates.

First of all, introduce yourself!

My name is Sue Runyon and I am a military spouse, mom of an 8 year old boy and artist.

And tell us about your shop.

Sue Runyon Designs is a jewelry design business that I run out of my home. I sell my designs on the internet from my on-line store, Sue Runyon Designs and in my Etsy store of the same name. As a military spouse I love being able to work from home and have a ready made job that moves with me whenever we move.

My business started a few years back when we lived in South Korea. I was able to travel to China and buy pearls to make jewelry for myself. I learned the old-fashioned way to string pearls by hand-knotting them on silk thread and taking extra time to cover the silk at the clasp attachment with tiny coils of French wire for added durability. It’s a quality technique that is not used much anymore. At first I just made things for myself and some friends, but when my designs started selling right off my neck, it turned into a business.

Can we take a peek at your craft space?

Come right in! I’m afraid it’s not very exciting to look at. As I mentioned above, I am a military spouse who moves often. That doesn’t really give me time to personalize every space as I would like. Here I’ve claimed an extra upstairs bedroom and left the walls builder’s white. I haven’t even taken time to hang much of anything on the walls.

I’d love to have large cabinets to store all my supplies in, but with frequent moves these storage bins are efficient. The movers will just stuff paper into the tops, tape them up and move them like that. That keeps me from having a huge stack of mystery cardboard boxes when we move. These are full of all my craft supplies for quilting, basket making, stained glass, drawing, tatting, paper crafts, etc.

My table space is also no-frills and portable. It does give me a lot of surface area to work on. I have a small TV to keep my company while I work and usually have it set to HGTV.

Since I sell on-line, I have to photograph my work. I have this small tabletop photo light box set up with my camera and tripod. And, of course, the shots need to be styled so I keep a collection of props on top of yet another stack of bins.

My favorite aspect of my studio is the view from the window. We have a small backyard in Las Vegas that we recently landscaped ourselves. My husband made this flagstone bench for me and I can see it from my upstairs window. I also often use the bench surface in my jewelry photography when the outdoor light is right.

Is your craft space your ideal space? What do you love about it and what do you want to change?

I feel I’m very fortunate to have a dedicated craft space. If we lived a more settled life, I would love to install cabinets and to have even more surface area so I could have several designs in progress at once. I’d love a dedicated space for packaging orders and to paint and decorate my space. One change I am planning is to purchase a life-size French dress form to use to photograph necklaces on in order to give a better idea of the scale of the piece.

What is your favorite thing to make?

I don’t have one thing in particular that I enjoy making. I just love to create. I often work on custom orders and find it gratifying to work with customers to create THEIR vision.

Do you covet anyone else’s craft room?

Martha Stewart’s. Well, who wouldn’t?

And because MY craft space seems to be in a state of disarray 95% of the time, how often does your craft space look picture perfect?

It’s all picked up for these photos, but honestly, it never looks like this otherwise. The table’s surface is normally covered in beads and findings that I’m “auditioning” for the current project. I usually have an ironing board set up that acts as a surface to spread out finished pieces that I’m getting ready to photograph or package. And, yes, there’s usually even a heap of clean laundry that I need to get around to ironing too.

Random tidbit.

The gorgeous rug on the floor is one of my favorites that my husband purchased when he was stationed in Turkey.

Stop by Sue Runyon Designs to find beautiful pieces of jewelry, including this  interchangable gemstone dangle for the silver hoops she offers – adorable and oh so tempting!