Setting-up your Home Office

Posted by Offer Tsuriel on October 21, 2009

You have a lot of decisions to make in setting up your home office, it’s best to make as many of them before you start any construction. Some of the decisions depend solely on your personal preferences – for example: the color of the room and the window treatment. I can’t help you with these except to advise you to make the room as comfortable and cheerful as you can and leave space for personal items. Family photos on your desk and artwork on the wall can make a space much more pleasant to work in.

Some of your decisions will be based on kind of work you plan to do in the office. For example, if you are highly computerized, you will have to make room for all your computer equipment. Your budget will also influence your decisions, bet remember that it is better to start with few high quality items and add to them later, then to outfit your entire office with things you will have to replace very soon.

 

Before you start compromising make a wish list. Write down everything you would like to have in your ideal office. After you decided what you want think about the limiting factors that are keeping you from building the ideal office. Then you can start making adjustments to your wish list. You may be surprised how close you can get with a little compromise and a common sense.

You will find that it is a treat to plan a home office tailor made just for you, one that reflects your style and personality, caters to your work equipments, and dovetails with your other commitments. Pamper yourself with at least one luxury item, whether it is a leather chair or an espresso machine. And don’t rush your decisions – you may be living with the results for a long time. Enjoy the process, it is an exciting challenge.

Space planning

First things first, where will you put your office? How will you fit what you need into this space? Choosing the right space for your home office is most important if you try to work at home full time, since you will be spending a great deal of time there. The location, of course, will be constrained by what spaces you have available. Still, try not to choose a space just because it is available. We all have spaces that are available because they aren’t useful for anything. These are not necessarily the best choices for a home office.

A home office can be located in an outbuilding, attic, or basement. However, these spaces often require substantial renovation before you can begin to furnish them. Also basements can be damp, attics can be very hot, and neither one typically has good natural light. Outbuildings, tough, can be effective home offices since they are more likely to be quite, well lit and isolated from interruptions.

The most practical space for your home office is an existing room or portion of a room inside your home. Such a space will require little, if any, renovation even if you want to separate a portion of a room from the reminder, you can do this using a freestanding screen. The most you will have to do to ready the apace is to add some extra electrical capacity for office machines and lighting.

If possible, choose a space that can be made attractive and inviting. A quite well-ventilated space with plenty of natural light is ideal, although I would try to position the main work area so you are not directly in front of a window. A view is nice, but if it is right there every time you look up it can be a distraction.

Creating the plan

Once you have decided on a location, you can choose a layout. To do this you will have to create some simple drawings. They don’t have to be fancy but they do have to be drawn to scale. The easiest way to do this is to use graph paper. But, first you will have to map out your room, so you will need a notepad, a pencil with an eraser, and a tape measure.

Taking dimensions
Start with the floor plan and elevations. Once you finish them, you can transfer your measurements to graph paper to create accurate scale drawings.

Draw a rough sketch of the floor plan of the room, including doors, windows and any odd corners the room may have. Measure all of the features you have drawn and note the dimension on the sketch. Accuracy is critical, so double check all of your measurements. Also note on the sketch any other details that can affect the placement of your office furniture, the size of the molding, which way the doors swing. Note the location of all the light switches, electrical outlets, and heat sources.

Next sketch the elevation view of each wall. Draw in the doors, windows and other features. Measure these items and record their dimensions on the sketches. Also check the ceiling height on the of chance that it will limit the height of the shelving.

Making Scale drawings
Using the information and dimensions in the rough sketches, create accurate scale drawings of your room, one floor plan and elevation for each wall, you will need some Imperial graph paper, a drafting triangle, a ruler, a pencil , an eraser and a pen. Refer to the drawings you just made for precise measurements and transfer them to the graph paper. Be sure to add the locations of the electrical outlets, switches and heating sources. You should also illustrate the swing of any doors since this can affect the placement of furniture.

Office Layout

At this point you are ready to determine the furniture layout of your office.
Print

the illustrations above and carefully cut out the components you might want to have move of. Next, arrange the components on the scale drawings you made to determine the best layout for your room. The furniture components are designed to be flexible, so you can decide how many of which peaces you will need. Use the following information as a guide for deciding appropriate placement, and, when done, you will have your own plan and can begin sizing and building the individual components.

Ergonomics
Before you charge ahead with your plan, you should take ergonomics into consideration; it will almost certainly affect your final decision on the layout of your home office.

Ergonomics is the study of the range of human movement and our physical interaction with the world around us. Ergonomic research allows us to set guidelines based on the average size and range of motion of a typical person. Ergonomic question and the answers to them used to be relatively simple: How high should the chair or desk be? How much room the person need to write comfortably at a desk? Should a task chair be the same height as a side chair?

Today, however, the issues are much more complex. A lot is going on in a home office, especially a one with a computer and all its associated peripherals. Many of our spaces have to do a double duty. We need space on our desks for a computer (or at least for the keyboard, mouse and monitor), but we also need space for papers around the computer. Any one who has ever had to copy something from a paper into a computer knows what I mean. We seem to be perpetually crowded, and crowding doesn’t make us healthy or efficient.

To make the home office functional we must choose the right desk and chair and position the furniture and equipment to maximize efficiency and minimize physical effort and discomfort. Your home office should be designed with practicality as well as comfort in mind. This requires careful planning and analysis; in other words, the office needs to be designed ergonomically.

Before making any decision, think about how you work and what your physical requirements are. Doing this now will not only save your time and expense, but also, more importantly, will help you avoid long term strains and injury for using badly designed or incorrectly positioned products. Think about the amount of time you will spend in this space, how long you’ll sit at your desk, how often you will get up, and what items you will need around you. What kind of equipment is most important to you and what can you afford to spend?

Seating

There is no clearer example of ergonomic design (good and bad) then chairs. I’m sure you have a nice, reasonably comfortable extra chair around your home that you may be tempted to use for your office. A dining room chair, for example, could certainly be used as an office chair for a short time. But if you intend to sit for many hours in front of your computer, you will be better of relegating this chair to visitors and purchasing a work of task chair.
A chair that adjusts to fit your body, and making so with a poorly designed chair carries a price. The strain from sitting with a curved spine is approximately three times greater then from standing. To minimize strain, choose chair whose back inclines inward to support your lumbar area and that moves as you stretch or lean back and forward. Ideally, the chair back should be high and wide enough to support your back and shoulders, and the chair should have armrests to take the weight of your neck and shoulders. Many office-supply stores sell very reasonably priced task chairs that look like if they do the job, but you shouldn’t be seduced by looks.
How do you feel at the end of the day? Are you exhausted and cranky or still fresh? Good ergonomics is what makes the difference. Your own body is your best measure of your needs; just allow yourself feel what’s right. You can adjust for a poor working condition for a hour or two, but in time the wrong chair, desk, or lightning will undermine even the healthiest lifestyle. The ergonomic choice is always the healthiest one.

Desks

In your office you should have as much desk area as possible. This is a good strategy because the desk is where you work and it fills up quickly. Since desk is the center of your home office, any ergonomic improvement will produce benefits for you all day long. Not long ago the desk was gloriously free of any mechanical clutter. The only objects necessary was a small light, an inkwell and a set of writing quills. These days, electronic office tools crowd the desktop. The personal computer vies for space with machines that copy, fax, dial and answer the telephone, and keep track of appointments.