Thread August 23, 2014 editorial: comments

For the Richard Devine interview just posted yesterday, Devine kindly gave us a bunch of photos of his amazing studio to use with the story. Besides the sheer amount of gear he has, you’ll notice that everything is incredibly well organized and neat. It’s very impressive.

We'd probably all agree that it's more pleasant (and probably more productive) to work in a studio that's both tidy and organinzed. For those of us with home studios, working in spaces that are generally a lot smaller than Devine’s (albeit with a lot less gear), keeping things in order is a challenge. I certainly want to keep my studio neat, and I do have a place for everything (well, almost everything), but when I’m in heat of the creative moment, I don’t feel like stopping and wrapping up a cable or putting an instrument back in its case, I want to keep recording!

But then it always starts building up. Cables are on the floor, instruments are strewn around, and the little things like adapters and capos and iOS charger cables are constantly disappearing, only to reappear later underneath a pile of papers. Eventually, when it gets bad enough, I clean it up and start the whole process over. 

With all that being said, I’m always interested in ways to get more organized in my studio that can help me slow down the pace of clutter. One thing that has helped a lot was getting a bunch of plastic storage bins and boxes, organizing all the cables, adapters, software and so forth by type, and dedicating one container for each. I used a label maker to neatly label each container, and I stacked them in a storage closet (If your studio doesn't have a storage area, you could stack them against one of the walls). It has helped a lot.

So what do you do to keep your studio organized and neat? Have you developed any systems that work for you? If we all share ideas, we can all benefit. Let’s hear yours!

Have a great week!

Mike Levine

U.S. Editor

Audiofanzine