EXTREME MAKEOVER: QUARANTINE EDITION

Last week, a chair changed my life.

Yep, you read that right. A chair. Changed. My life. It sounds crazy, I know. But last week, I bought a chair which made me completely re-evaluate how I use the small amount of personal space that I have in quarantine and helped me out of a seemingly endless emotional and artistic slump.  

For the past twelve months, I’ve been quarantining in my parents’ house, where my small bedroom has become my art studio, dance studio, office and classroom. This twelve-month span is the longest period of time I’ve ever lived here — my parents moved down to Southern California from the Bay Area as soon as I’d graduated high school to be closer to my grandparents. My bedroom was always just the place I would sleep when I came home for the weekend here and there, or a storage unit for all of my stuff during a few months of summer. But now, it’s my everything space. 

Up until recently, all I had in my room was my bed, my desk and two bookcases. But then a few weeks ago, I started looking for ways to spruce it up. I bought a small ottoman with some extra money from a Target gift card, and put up some pictures and a bulletin board on the walls. 

And then, I bought a chair from Home Depot. 

It’s a simple white chair with wooden arms, which sits in the corner of my room by my closet — nothing too fancy or groundbreaking. But in the past week, this chair has been my safe haven. 

I used to wake up in bed, check the latest news, then head over to my desk to start the workday, returning to my bed when the work was done to have a remote Netflix Party with my boyfriend or FaceTime my friends. Back and forth, back and forth, endlessly. But now, I have another option. I can do my work at my desk, or in my chair. I can watch Netflix or take a video call in my bed, or in my chair. And I can go down the TikTok rabbit hole…well, really anywhere, but now there’s a new spot for it! 

It seems like such a minor difference, having one more potential place to sit. But this chair changed my life because it gave me choices. It gave me control — something we have so little of right now in our world that’s constantly on fire, both literally and figuratively. 

The new level of autonomy that I felt from having a new option in my space got me thinking about the way that I organized the rest of it. I made some changes that turned the “everything space” of my bedroom into a set of different small spaces, which helped me compartmentalize and maintain a sense of normalcy in quarantine, while also boosting my creative productivity. Here’s how you can do the same to your space in three easy steps.

1. Designate “activity zones” 

Look around your space and think about where you’d like to work in it, where you’d like to relax in it, where you’d like to do a workout in it, etc. Now draw out a mockup of your room and divide the space into zones based on what activity you’ll do there.