My husband designs learning spaces professionally. So its kind of funny, how long it took us to reconsider and reconfigure our dining room. We've held it separate and clung to the myth of family dinners there for 7 years. But its most used as creative space. Even after I decided to officially creatify the area, it still took me another week to turn to my husband and ask him for advice.

The first thing I noticed, after manifesting official creative space, is that artists are private. We all like to have our work out, in process. But no one wants to answer questions about it. Everyone, I think almost universally, wants the time and space to do what they want to do without being pestered by questions or even by too much observation. (Varied levels of gaze and observation may be one of the most stifling things about institutional school.)

So I've got a drawing going. My daughter has a skirt going. My husband is writing music in there, hooking up his looper to the amp in the corner. Musicians gather in there and move furniture around. This is all good. But it requires a certain amount of grace and good manners to share creative space. People who understand the growth of buildings (did you know buildings have their own life and growth?) can look at what is happening in the room and see a need for different kinds of furniture. And a need to organize all the stuff in a way to enhance feelings of both privacy and collaboration.