Since Stefani and I started SortJoy in 2020, we have had the most incredible group of professionals behind us. Whether we connected over social media or met in person, there are so many professional organizers and interior designers that have been instrumental in spreading the word about us when the opportunity presents itself.
Jessica Klein from Oh Design Studio is someone we connected with very early on over Instagram. She loved our bins and we loved her design work. When the opportunity presented itself to work with Jessica and Liz Greene, a contributor for Mother Untitled, we could not have been more excited!
Mother Untitled, is a publication specifically geared toward ambitious women embracing a career break to focus on family for a chapter of their lives. It is such a incredible source with honest perspectives, downloadable guides, and even job openings.
Liz needed to take a formal living room and turn it into a playroom/workspace. In Liz’s words, “In my dream world, I’d have my own home office. But when we moved into our new home last winter, I soon realized a room to myself wasn’t in the cards. We have three busy little boys and their needs–bedrooms and a solid playspace–are a bigger priority at this time.” Liz documents the planning and transformation of this space in her piece for Mother Untitled, Home Tour: One Mom’s Smart & Chic Office Playroom Design.
The amount of useful information in this piece is staggering, and we highly suggest you check it out for yourself, but here are a few of our favorite quotes from the article and images of the space!
"The goal was for this space to be clean, in both design and organization, gentle on the eye, while still maintaining a sense of whimsy and fun. I wanted the playspace to capture the boys’ sweet energy and sense of adventure. The work area needed to have an overall calm vibe–not to compete with the playspace but rather complement it–and help bring this tired mama a sense of order and inspiration, and thus, productivity."
the before:
"We planned to put our large desk at one end, facing outwards onto our front lawn, making that area the workspace. It would take up approximately ⅓ of the whole room.
The rest of the space, the remaining ⅔ of the room, would be for the boys to play. We would incorporate a large rug to define the playspace as separate from the desk area."
the after:
"When it came time for containing the individual toys, Jess introduced me to SortJoy, maker of sustainable bins and organizational tools that are absolutely gorgeous. We stocked up on their Original Sculpted Bins and their Wide Sculpted Bins and started filling them with our Magnatiles, Legos, trains, planes, and automobiles. SortJoy bins are so structured, they don’t tip or bend over, even with little hands tugging and pulling."
"It didn’t take long to realize another benefit of these simple yet effective containers: they look nice enough to leave out, and by keeping a few out and about, my boys have been dipping their hands into toys they haven’t played with in awhile, newly curious."
"When it comes to storing all the endless toys, games, and more, it’s best to go with the same type of bin, just in different sizes if possible. For example, when you open up the IKEA storage, you see all the same SortJoy bins, not a bunch of different storage boxes in different colors and sizes. This creates a sense of calm, even when the toys are of all different shapes, sizes, and colors"
Don't miss the full article, we only skimmed the surface here!
Nothing brings us more joy than seeing our bins used to add form and function to a space like this one. We want to thank Mother Untitled and Liz Greene again for sharing this story and Jessica Klein for being such a lovely long-time supporter of SortJoy!