Welcome back to This Old Journal. Work is well underway on our community room renovation. Over the past few days we've been meticulously prepping this room for paint. That meant patching some cracks and holes in the plaster walls, filling in nail holes in the woodwork and putting a coat of primer on the walls.

Our project committee has come up with a number of goals that we want this new space to accomplish. We want a seating area where staff can relax and meet informally. There's going to be space for community organizations to meet with seating for as many as 30 people.

We also want some private space in a small bump out where staff could take a phone call or a client could check email while waiting on changes to an ad. There will also be space to transform this entire room into a photo studio where we can photograph covers for our sister magazine, Chicago Parent.

The project committee has also picked out our paint colors and as we say at the Journal "We have no fear when it comes to paint colors."

For top of the walls a warm cream color, contrasted by this brilliant yellow for the lower wall. Wrapping the entire room will be this blue for the trim, and there is a lot of trim. In addition to four windows and four door openings there is about 300 linear feet of trim in this room.

The paint is just half of this project. For the first time we'll be working with a local interior designer, Kellie Scott, owner of Divine Consign, and she'll be helping us come up with a floor plan as well as picking out the final furnishings from their extensive collection. She's already been by to take some measurements and we're all eager to see the plan she brings us.

Later this week we'll check in with Kelly and see her plan for the space. We're also going to show how to replace and replicate some of the original details dating back to 1923.