Making It Crafter and Interior Designer Builds a Space of Her Own

For Joanna Gick — interior designer, crafter extraordinaire, and finalist on NBC’s crafting competition show "Making It" — color and creativity are a way of life. According to the designer’s website, she’s been enamored with art and crafting since childhood, begging her mother to take her to craft stores and try any art class she could find

The crafty co-owner of j+j Design Group recently completed building out a rainbow-inspired personal studio in her house dedicated to her Etsy shop, Ohsojodesigns.

During her day job as designer at j+j Design Group, Gick designs according to clients’ needs and wants, and sometimes, — which — sometimes rules out playing with as much color as she’d ordinarily like. So, when it came to building a new workroom for her own burgeoning craft and design line, Gick conceptualized the space using an abundance of color. “I had always wanted a rainbow room that was bright and happy. Just like a breath of fresh air when you walked in,” she said. Her twist on the classic rainbow color scheme? Take the original red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple colors and opt for pastel versions of each. For Gick, this pastel take on the traditional rainbow palette creates a calming space while still incorporating a ton of color.

When it came to choosing the right colors for the space, Gick turned to Dunn-Edwards. “In my opinion, Dunn-Edwards has the best paint color selection out there. I have never not been able to find the right shade or tone I was looking for,” she said.

The designer ultimately chose three shades of pink, peach, yellow, mint, blue and lilac. The colors are as follows:

• Pinks: Nosegay (DE5070), Baby Girl (DE5071), Bubblegum (DE5072)
• Peaches: Rose Frost (DE5127), Peachy Keen (DE5128), Peachtree (DE 5129)
• Yellows: Lit (DE5337), Twinkling Lights (DE5338), Firefly Glow (DE5339)
• Mints: Mint Condition (DE5679), Spearmint (DE5729), Island Oasis (DE5730)
• Blues: Shallow End (DE5680), Pale Jade (DE5681), Tinted Ice (DE5728)
• Lilacs: Sheer Lavender (DE5980), First Lilac (DE5981), Plum Point (DE5982)

Gick accomplished the technical aspect of creating her straight rainbow lines by placing vertical strips of painter’s tape on sections of wall and painting between each piece of tape. Once she peeled the tape off, she was left with cheery and sophisticated bursts of color on her walls and floor. The designer felt confident in her vision and with her paint choices as “the quality of Dunn-Edwards paints are second-to-none,” she said.

Gick’s discipline for planning helped keep her on task. Though designing for herself this time around, Gick may as well have been designing for a client — in fact, she put together a design board to help stay organized. She also implemented tried-and-true tricks of any seasoned maker: Gick sketched out her ideas, made a template, and always measured twice before making decisions. Her preparation also extended to the way she painted, too. Gick explained that she got more mileage out of each mini-roller for her project by wrapping them in tin foil after finishing for the day (to retain moisture) so she didn’t have to wash rollers out in between each paint application.

Now, the designer and crafter who lives to make rainbow-inspired earrings and vibrant wall decor has a creatively-inspired space equal to the task.

Images courtesy of Joanna Gick