So if you’re friends with Val on Facebook, you’ve been teased for weeks about something big that’s happening. Well it’s taken a few weeks to get all our ducks in a row, but yesterday I made it official, so we can finally announce publicly - we have signed a lease on a studio space!!!
This is something that I have always dreamed of, well maybe not always, but ever since I started this business from the basement of my college apartment six years ago I’ve thought it would be amazing to have a studio space. When Val entered into the picture she started talking about it as well. But even as our business grew and grew it still seemed out of reach in so many ways. Even so, Val was always scouring various resources seeing what spaces were available.
Then she found this ad on Craigslist for a space in Lake Mills in the upstairs of a downtown building. The photos were not impressive. I dismissed it nearly immediately, but she still kept coming back to it until finally she was so curious she convinced me we should at least go take a look.
Not expecting much, we walked up the stairs with the owner. The hallway showed some signs of promise - it wasn’t the rotting disaster I was expecting. Then we walked into the room and cautiously started looking around. It was actually nice. Really nice. Where was the peeling paint and falling down ceiling that I expected? Where were the holes in the walls? Where were the electrical outlets that were so old they must have been installed by Edison himself? That’s what I expected, but Val and I were both pleasantly surprised.
We left Lake Mills and continued on our drive to Chicago. The whole way there we tried to think of every conceivable reason why it wouldn’t work. We tried to think of what was wrong with the place and why it would make no sense for us to take this kind of risk. On our drive home from Chicago late that night, we switched to dreaming of what it could be, and by the time we got home I think we were both convinced that we needed to do it.
I read a quote once that said, “There is no security on this earth. Only opportunity.” That’s what this is for us - opportunity. It certainly didn’t come when we expected it, but I’m a firm believer that when opportunity presents itself, we all need to be ready to go for it in order to be successful. It will be a lot of work for Val and I, and there will be many challenges, but we think we’re up to it.
In the next couple weeks I’ll be getting the space ready for our wonderful clients - I’ll keep you all up to date on our progress. There are other big things on the horizon as well - we’re so excited about our other news that we can’t wait to unveil it! We’ll have more big news before the summer is out, but for now we’re basking in the glory of our new studio!
We occupy the front of the upstairs, so the 2nd story windows are ours and our door, which will be replaced, is on the right.
The entrance to the gallery and studio after you come up the stairs.
This will be our gallery and meeting area.
This is the other room. Our shooting area will be in this part of the room.
In this part of the second room we will have our post production area. (There’s still some junk to be cleaned out!)
