I shook hands today....

I came to an agreement with the landlord today. As of December 1st, I will have brand new studio space. They have to draw up the lease. I have to design the floor space. They are paying for the improvements.

760 square feet to shoot in. All mine. Yes, I will share it with some friends. Will sublet for photography classes and shoots.

I have one long wall about 50 feet long or longer the full length of the space to make a gallery.
There is a restaurant right there that draws a nice crowd of upscale people who will see my space. I can have signage too - facing the street possible.
I will have a camera room about 25 feet by 25 feet.
I will have a room for props and a room for makeup and wardrobe.
I will have a meeting area/living room.

There were two separate photography businesses in the building - mixed retail/office space; both grew out of their spaces.

Congrats Kathy,

We're all so proud of you! When can I move in?

Asher

I have some 10ft high blue plastic high fashion backgrounds made up of wavy horizontal strips of tanslucent blue plastic that hang. I'll send you a PM if you would like some!

Congrats!
Is is the same place you were talking here in OPF last week?
it seems to be the right plan for business!

Maybe you could shoot some pics and post here the "before / after" installation…

Many congratulations Kathy!!!

I wish you great success in your new venture, like Nic I'd love to see some before/after shots, great news to start the day again!!

Yes...good idea!

And I think as soon as it's all finalized, I ought to have a photo with a Grand Opening banner too!

What a start! Superb Kathy, here is to whishing you all the success and fun under the sun!

Hey, Kathy, huge congrats!
When do we start redecorating? ;-)

Measured

They'll have my lease drafted by tomorrow.

I have to decide on a floor plan - they'll start building next week already!

They have to rip out the (Yuck!) pink carpet and the strawberry pink walls need two or three coats of a soft, warm white. I am hoping there is no lineoleum underneath the carpet because I wanted to have shellacked cement floors so I could drag props and stuff around. If there was vinyl down before either I have to pay to put in something other than carpet. So I will have to see what happens.

If all the legal-ese is okay then I can have keys at the end of the month and I have to pay rent on December 1st. I better remember my camera tomorrow to show you all the starting place.

This is so exciting even for me, I can only imagine how *you* are feeling!
Let me know if you need any help with blueprints, I'm an engineer for crying out loud...

Kathy Rappaport said:

If all the legal-ese is okay then I can have keys at the end of the month and I have to pay rent on December 1st. I better remember my camera tomorrow to show you all the starting place.

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Hi Kathy,

You've got busy times ahead, but building up a business is also very rewarding. Do make sure you document the construction activities and people involved with plenty of photo's. You'll probably be so occupied/distracted with managing all sorts of aspects, legalese, suppliers, and other practical things, that you perhaps won't be able to fully enjoy the actual build-up of your 'kingdom'. The pictures will help to enjoy that part when the dust literally settles, so indeed don't forget your camera.

Congrats and good luck,

Bart

Bart_van_der_Wolf said:

...Do make sure you document the construction activities and people involved with plenty of photo's. You'll probably be so occupied/distracted with managing all sorts of aspects, legalese, suppliers, and other practical things, that you perhaps won't be able to fully enjoy the actual build-up of your 'kingdom'. The pictures will help to enjoy that part when the dust literally settles, so indeed don't forget your camera...

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Hi Kathy,

Fantastic news, I wish you all the luck you can get. The advice given by Bart is great, please take a lot of pictures along the way. You might even have a small studio exhibition based on those pictures later.

Cheers,

Good thoughts

Gee, Bart, my accounting office is practically right next door. I will be working away while they are building and I hope before I go on my vacation at the end of the month it will be finished and ready to move in the end of November when I get back from my travels. The big reason I took more space than I really wanted was so I could go back and forth between the two offices and one day I will give up the accounting. My husband is going to take over some of my accounting work. I actually was hoping they would not have it ready until January. But sometimes you have to pay a little extra to not let it slip away. It's a great location for me. I've been looking for a space for almost 6 months.

Nik, my landlord is the kind that just has people hanging around waiting for projects. They work off of scratch paper. When we built out our accounting office, nothing was written down. They just did the work. It was pretty funny. I appreciate the offer. I work pretty good with grid paper and rulers. I love to design things.

I never thought about the build out being gallery material. Ummm....

Asher...

Asher posted a link to this thread. He sounded just a like a proud Dad and I realized that I have been posting a little here but not a ton and few pix and maybe I needed to update you all since I have a plateful. I feel that I am living in a dream!

As we all know the worldwide economy has not been too kind. I did not give up accounting work completely to just work at my studio. I have been building up my business acumen and reputation among the wedding/portrait photo world a bit. I have been shooting consistantly having done several weddings and realizing that while they are fun, Non-wedding events are more fun with less stress. I am still doing them but want to limit the numbers. It's hard to pump out 1000 images that have the quality I'd like on all of them. I've been shooting kids, and portraits and headshots. I am getting more and more inquires and bookings and people in my community are talking( some a raving!) about my work and I am doing a lot of marketing - which is why I haven't been as active. I have a few fine art installations to put together. This is all good stuff that I am proud of. Much of it's just familiar stuff to many of you

This is what I am turning out for environmental portraiture. This is SOOC except for a crop and light vignette in Lightroom.

I'm not Asher but I'm glad too, that things sorted out well for you.
Still you had to take the plunge and it doesn't works for all........

Nice portrait - looks very °life°, and please to don't use to many acronym's, like South Orange County ;-)

Hi Kathy

Nice to hear more about how things are going for you, glad it's working out well....