Planning a Cozy and Organized Home Office

See our plans for a cozy and organized home office space that will be both functional and beautiful at the same time!

Most times when we work on rooms or projects in our house, we end up doing it little by little over a longer period of time. My office has been like this. This room, which is the “bonus room” over the garage, was actually the room that sold us on the model of home we chose…

These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office nook, office before photos

I knew my office would have to serve a bunch of different purposes– a place to work, of course, but also a storage area, a project room, a photo and video backdrop, and even a workout area– so having a great big open space with endless possibilities was really exciting!

As they say, though, “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” 😉 Since all of my storage pieces from my office in our townhouse stayed with the house, I had to scrounge up leftover furniture and attempt to create some semblance of order and organization until we had the time to work on this space. For a while, it looked like this:

These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office nook, office before photos, pillow storage
These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office nook, office before photos, frames and printer
These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office nook, office before photos, decor items

Eek!

The first part of this room that we worked on last spring was the little nook area. It was set off by itself and it wasn’t huge, so I knew that I could at least get a little piece of my office looking the way I wanted it without a large amount of time and effort. The nook became my little haven in our house, and I have spent countless hours working, reading, and relaxing there since we finished it!

This post contains affiliate links. For more information, see my disclosures here.

These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office nook, IKEA hack

Desk | Desk Chair | Arm Chair | Ottoman | Side Table

We still had the storage issue to figure out, though, so right after Christmas we whipped up a plan and installed an IKEA PAX unit in one corner so that I could finally have a built-in spot to hold some of my items. I was thrilled! (You can see a full tour of the PAX unit in this post.)

These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office nook, IKEA hack, IKEA PAX system

My office space was coming together, but we still had about half of the room to tackle. After we installed the PAX unit in January, the other side of the room looked like this:

These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office before

Rather than wait another 6 months and try to pull things together bit by bit, Donnie and I decided that we would do a one week sprint and try to complete the rest of the room in one fell swoop… call us crazy! 😉 And while it’s still not 100% done as I type this, it has gotten a whole lot closer, and I am so excited about how it’s coming together!

Planning a Cozy and Organized Home Office

Over the next few weeks I thought I’d share some of the projects that have gone into finishing off my office space, so today I’m laying out “the plan” so you can see a little bit of where it’s headed! Here’s what we started with:

These plans for an organized home office that is both functional and beautiful are so inspiring! | organization, organization goals, home office organization, organized craft room, mood board, feminine home office, office nook, IKEA hack, A Cozy and Organized Home Office, design board, mood board, IKEA BESTA

Paint Colors: White, Gray, Aqua (color matched in Behr Marquee paint)

Floor Lamp | Arm Chair | Side Table | Shelf | Storage Piece | Stencil

Roman Shade | Etagere | Chair | Ceiling Light | Table

You can see the floor plan in the center, with my already-completed nook being that little area that juts out. The PAX unit is in the corner that is directly across from the doors, so that was already finished as well.

On the big back wall where the doors are, I planned to add a stenciled wall feature using the Donatella stencil from Royal Design Studio. I was a little nervous about this project because I had never stenciled a wall before, but though time consuming, it was surprisingly easier than I expected– I’ll be sharing the tutorial soon!

On the same wall, I wanted to add a bit more storage that could also serve as a pretty focal point in this space. I originally planned to use IKEA BILLY bookcases and hack them up a little bit, but in the end we decided to go with IKEA’s BESTA system instead, which we had used for our living room built-ins as well. As we did in the living room, we wanted to use the BESTA pieces as a base and then add some of our own trim work to make it look a little fancier and more custom. (I’ll have a post all about that process as well!)

Because this room is pretty large (21’8″ x 13′ 7″ + the nook!), I had room for a little reading corner along this wall, so I am planning to bring in a small chair, lamp, and side table to create a cozy spot.

One of the things I knew I would need space for in this room is pillow storage! Some girls’ weakness is shoes or handbags– mine is throw pillows! (Oops!) When I found this etagere piece, I knew it would not only solve my pillow problem but even leave me some extra space to store some paper and office items as well. It will go between the two windows, which will be covered with these pretty Roman shades from SelectBlinds.

Another thing I wanted to make sure I added in to this room was another larger work surface. My desk is great for sitting with my laptop and typing, but sometimes when I’m working on a project or taking photos, I need more space to spread out.

The thing that made choosing this surface a little tricky is that I wanted it to be able to “float”– I wanted to put it in the middle of the room so I could sit there and have a pretty background for photos or videos, but I also wanted to be able to move it out of the way so I could keep the big space in the middle of the room open if need be.

For this to be possible, I needed a surface that was big-ish, but also fairly light so I could move it around easily. I ended up finding the INGO table at IKEA, which is an unfinished dining table. I planned to give it a whitewash coat to help it fit with the feel of the rest of the room. I originally planned to add casters to it as well, but it ended up being so light that I didn’t even need to– woohoo!

Finally, I needed a light fixture for the middle of the room. This was a lot trickier than I expected it to be because the room is big, so the fixture needed to be a decent size so it didn’t look like a little dot in the middle of the ceiling, but the ceilings are only 8′ high, so it couldn’t hang down very far. After looking at just about every ceiling light on the internet, I found this oversized flush mount light on mega sale at Pottery Barn. It is going to be installed this week, and I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it will be perfect for the space!

So that’s the plan! As I mentioned, Donnie and I have been busy little bees putting the plan into action, and I actually shared our progress in real time in my Instagram stories last week– you can still see them in the “highlights” section of my @msabbylawson Instagram profile if you want to see how things are coming along! I will be back soon with more update posts and photos!

Update: The office is done! You can see all of the projects we completed in the space and the final reveal in these posts:

What room or project are you planning for your house these days? I would love to hear about it in the comments!

Have a wonderful week!

This post contains affiliate links. For more information, see my disclosures here.

16 Comments

  1. Love the insight to your office plan! It’s beautiful and inviting! This year I hope to complete a board & batten wall for our breakfast nook, organize our garage, and begin furnishing and decorating our outdoor patio. But just like you said — Rome wasn’t built in a day! Hopefully we get around to tackling at least half of our to-do list.

    1. justagirlabby says:

      So fun! Sound like great goals for the year! Enjoy! <3

      ~Abby =)

  2. Micah | Home Faith Family says:

    I have loved watching this room transform on your Instagram page, and adore how the stencil turned out for you on your insta-video. Good luck with setting everything up! You’ve put a lot of work into this haven of yours. I’m so excited for you. =)

    1. justagirlabby says:

      Aw, thank you so much, Micah! It’s been a fun project and I can’t wait to see it completely finished! 🙂 Ah! Hope you’re having a wonderful week, friend! <3

      ~Abby =)

      1. Micah | Home Faith Family says:

        You too, friend.

  3. Isabel Freitas says:

    I love he plan and I can’t wait to see it all finished up. I love the inspiration board you made and I think it helps a lot so you don’t get lost on the colors and styles. I’m going to do a makeover in my boys’ bedroom and I will definitely create a board like this so i don’t get lost in the way!

    1. justagirlabby says:

      Thanks so much, Isabel! Can’t wait ’til it’s finished and I can share! 🙂 Hope you’re having an awesome week!

      ~Abby =)

  4. Karen Hobson says:

    I cannot find your Profile and Highlights. I’m sure it’s just me.

    1. justagirlabby says:

      Hi, Karen! If you search justagirl_abby on Instagram on your phone, my profile will come up. When it does, look in the middle of the screen above the actual post pictures and you will see a 5 little circles labeled “office day 5”, “office day 3”, etc. If you click on the little circles you will be able to watch them. Hope this helps. Thanks!

      ~Abby =)

      1. Karen Hobson says:

        Found it. I was trying on my desktop computer and couldn’t see what I see on my phone. Thanks!

  5. Julie Briones says:

    Love how the office is coming along! Beautiful! Question…Have you sent out a newsletter since 1/27? I haven’t gotten one, and I’m concerned I was dropped.

    1. justagirlabby says:

      Thank you so much, Julie! I’ve been sending newsletters each Saturday, so they should be going out! I will have Donnie take a look at it and make sure you’re still on the list! Hope you’re having a great weekend!

      ~Abby =)

  6. I love your new office! I think your Roman shades may be just what we want for our RV renovation (still in the dream stages). Do you remember which fabric you chose?

  7. Love the peaceful nook. What is the name of the arm chair?
    Thanks for the inspiration.

    Veronica

Comments are closed.