From Pinterest boards into reality, sourcing furniture, and the behind-the-scenes DIYs, it’s been an exciting process bringing our podcast studio space to life.
Our goal has always been to share this space with other people because it’s not only a place we get to record and create in, but it’s also for our clients to use as well. It’s been life-changing to have our own quiet, inspirational, vibey, creative haven, and we’re so grateful to bring other people in here, too, and allow you to do the same.
Let’s look at each space of this Pinterest-worthy, Cleveland-based recording studio, equipped with the technology, furniture, and lighting for all your content needs.
What's a podcast studio?
Table of Contents
When it comes to this space, we call it a podcast studio because that is a marketing channel we believe is so strong, and also from a marketing perspective, it’s straightforward as to who we are and what we do.
Fun Fact: It’s not the only way people use the space though!
Here’s a look inside our podcast studio rental
Our 1,800 square foot space located on the corner of Orange and Main Street in Chagrin Falls is surrounded with windows and a crows nest view over our quaint town. Divided into a common area meeting space, 3 private recording rooms, a bathroom and kitchenette- our studio is more than just a place to record your podcast.
The Connection Room
The first private room in our space is what we call the Connection Room. From the modern custom art to the distinctive coral chairs to the fresh plants enveloping you, this intimate seating setup is perfect for thoughtful conversation and recordings. And with the simple, statement backdrop you’re sure to pop on camera.
Of course recording gear was top of mind for us too so we made sure to include quality equipment in every room. This room in-particular has two Shure SM7B mics, Elgato Low Profile Boom Arms, and a Rodecaster Pro II Mixer (allows for sound effects, call ins, Bluetooth connection and four mics). But the beautiful thing about our space is we can move these tools around into any space you record in!
The Conversation Room
We recently moved furniture around to create the Conversation Room so that you have more vignettes to choose from. We found that most people using our space were looking for vibey, done-and-ready-to-go setups so we thought the more the merrier!
This room has three different configurations for recording or meeting.
And as the most spacious room in the studio it’s definitely got the most bang for your buck if you’re looking at a single-room-rental. Overlooking the courtyard and river park, this brightly lit room offers a minimalist vignette with our wicker chairs, plants and abstract painting. Pivoting over to our gray swivel chairs you’ll find a light feminine vignette with a comfortable living room feel.
And for more than one guest or more space to spread out during your creation or meeting time, you’ll find our four top table with customizable shelves flanked by modern chairs.
(Other than the living room area) this is definitely the most collaborative space to create content or connect in.
And of course all of our audio and video recording gear as well as lighting setup is available to you here.
The Solo Room
After using our space for a year we found that most creatives (myself included) retreated to this room for two things:
1. The view
2. The solo sanctuary this room offers
So we decided to re-design around that. With our oversized seating for solo sitting, the cozy linen love seat offers a living room feel with a customizable backdrop to fit your vibe. Its palm leaf wall art with velvety sound-dampening forest green curtains gives you the option to either cover the wallpaper up or even bring your own curtains and swap them out all together to switch up the feel.
The comfortable velvet purple chair and a half, is my favorite spot to record alone in in this secluded corner of the studio. Recently, I’ve created all of my Substack recordings here, cozied up in this corner, looking out of the two windows here onto town. It’s fun to see what’s going on while also soaking up the natural sunlight and oasis vibes.
And as with all of our rooms you’ll find top-of-the-line recording equipment like a Shure SM7B mic on an Elgato low profile boom arm, connected with a Vocaster 2 Mixer. Plus our soft-box lights and blogger camera or web cam are available to move into any room.
Common Meeting Area
Recording isn’t limited to our recording rooms- we have more backdrop worthy spaces throughout the studio too- especially in our vibey, living room meeting area.
Some people like to use this space for team meetings, workshops or mastermind retreats. There is room for about 12 people to sit, gather and connect.
(I personally host a monthly mom’s-nights-in in this space- me and my two friends get together once a month and curl up on the couches and just get to connect.)
This space has two couches, two chairs, an additional set of chairs we can pull in. And we have a whole dining table with six seats around it too.
Our space also includes a little kitchenette and bathroom.
Ultimately this is a space for you to create and connect in.
We’ve created vignettes in every corner, so you can create in a room, or you can create out in an open space.
It’s a place to get inspired and share the message that you have to share in a space that’s not your house and in a beautiful space that reflects the branding of who you are and what you do.
Designing our podcast studio rental
Designing our podcast studio was honestly so much fun. Who wouldn’t love playing on Pinterest and bringing it to life?!
I knew I wanted each room to have a vibe that felt cohesive and curated but I also wanted to leave room for it to be customizable. So it wasn’t obvious on first glance that that person is recording in “X” Room at Mompreneur Co. Studios.
I wanted each person to be able to make it their own.
Start with comfortable furniture
In my design process, I started with chairs first and built the space around them for two reasons:
First, honestly, I’ve found that your furniture makes all the difference with your recording.
If you’re sitting in a desk chair, at a desk, especially if you’re doing your recordings virtually versus in-person, then you’re automatically a little bit stiffer. Your conversations are truly different so focusing on these comfortable living room-style chairs was really important to me because I knew what a difference it makes. (Right now, I’m in this big cozy oversized purple chair, which means I have my shoes off. I’m crisscrossed legged. I’ve got a blanket on me. I’ve got my tea next to me.)
You can show up more conversationally when you’re in something more comfortable, just like when you think about clothing.
A very key part, not only for the aesthetics of your recording but for the actual quality of the end product, is the furniture because it affects how you are showing up.
Megan Moran Tweet
When it comes to podcast recording, that’s what your audience wants from you. We’ve seen that pendulum swing with podcasting and content in general, that people don’t want the stiff PowerPoint version of what you have to share. They just want to feel like they are having a conversation with you.
Your audience wants to hear about the topics that mean something to them or the experiences they’ve lived that mean something to them. When you feel more comfortable and relaxed that means your conversation is more authentic.
You show up differently based on the setting that you’re in and so furniture was that first place that I started, and then I built a lot around it.
Secondly when it comes to designing the room around the chairs, statement chairs make for a great focal point and really set the tone. Plus it’s easy to swap out the room accessories and immediately change the look for the next client.
How we brought our podcast studio design ideas to life
Inspiration-wise I was really going for vibey, feminine, modern and minimalist. And once I started searching for that- Pinterest really delivered (especially with the more images like this feature.) I’d collect pictures I like and organize them based on room and before you know it the whole look would come together.
Then I’d scour Amazon for hours for a cool table or light fixture. And even came across a new company: English Elm where we sourced some of our bigger pieces of furniture for less.
Once we brought the items into the studio, I’d set them all up and move them around in different ways.
I remember specifically there was this one pin that I saved and I thought it was so cool. It was brick, but it was a dark green painted brick, and I’d never seen anything like that.
I didn’t know where it was going to go or what I was going to do with it, but I just thought it was so cool, and lo and behold, I ended up finding some squishy peel-and-stick faux brick panels. I put them on the wall in our living room area, and I painted them all dark green.
Choosing Podcasting Backdrops
Everything needed to be customizable. Whether it was hanging a versatile shelf to style plants, books and pictures on to match your vibe, or the sliding curtains to match your style. Even as simple as hanging your logo behind you makes it your own.
When you’re looking at your backdrop and you’re podcasting, or you’re creating any other content, it’s really important to think about what the backdrop is saying. What adjectives, emotions, and feelings that you want to evoke when somebody sees your content?
Consider the colors and the props, you’ll see I have a lot of natural items like I have a lot of plants in the studio. (I’m even using my mug that I’m drinking out of right here on this recording)..
These different elements lean into your messaging, so that’s why putting together a backdrop is important. It continues to tell your story for you, and it makes people feel a certain way without saying anything.
Podcast Tech
Besides your backdrop, you also have to consider what’s going on behind the scenes – the tech.
Podcasting Mic
In this recording, my mic is a Shure SM7B. I spent hours researching podcast tech – you can read the whole post here– and I didn’t just choose this mic because everybody else uses this mic, I chose it because it truly is the best.
I’ve listened to so many different recordings, I previously used a Blue Yeti mic for years, and I was just so impressed with the quality of this sound.
Boom Arm
I paired the Shure SM7B with a low-profile boom arm. This is important because I come from an Italian family and I’m a talker – which means I use my hands. If I had a mic just on a table, I would inevitably hit the table. I used to do this when I first was recording, and you hear all these weird sounds. A boom arm allows me to move my hands around and have the mic close enough to my mouth so that I have a great sound quality.
A boom arm also allows you to move the mic around easily in one direction or another, and it’s easy to readjust without having to like twist and turn all of these things.
Having the boom arm be low profile was important to me because the overhead boom arms felt cumbersome and in the way of the video shots, so they felt like they were getting in the way of creating.
When you are creating you of course want the high-quality tech around you to help make it look and sound good, but also don’t want them to become a distraction or barrier. Imagine the breakdown in your creative flow because of tech distractions for you the podcast host or for your audience.
This low profile boom arm puts the mic below the speaker, creating a clean shot from the camera, and the camera can get the perspective directly on the face and the mic isn’t in my way of that.
Mixers
Speaking of tech, a frequently asked question is “How do we get the mic audio into your computer and then into something that you can then share it with other people?”
We have two different types of recording mixers here at the Mompreneur Co. Studio. And if you’re a podcast tech beginner, that just means it’s the thing that plugs the microphone into your computer.
The one I’m recording on right now is a Vocaster 2, and I really like it because it’s just plug-and-play. Simple and straightforward. All you do is plug your mic into one end, and then the other end can plug into your computer, and then you choose this mic setup when you are choosing from your drop-down of audio options.
The other one that we have is more intense. It’s called a RODECaster Pro 2. This allows for you to hook up four different microphones. It’s a bit more complex in that you are able to record a phone call in. It also has a sound pad so you can add sound effects, and it allows you to record on the device.
When we do have people in here we tend to use this one because it’s nice to have a backup option. You never know when tech is going to give you an issue, and so to have a device that is also recording, in addition to your computer. The RODECaster allows for if the sound goes weird or if the tech shuts off, you always have a backup. For podcasting recording is important!
Video
We always say that if you’re recording, grab the video because you can’t ever get it back. While we do have fancy cameras here in the studio, like a Sony ZV-1 Blogger Camera + a Razer Kiyo Webcam [and personally a Sony Alpha 7Cii], we often end up using our iPhone for podcast recording.
You can use your iPhone as a webcam, and the quality is so good. So while we use a nicer more advanced camera for our cinematography style Youtube videos, this setup is working great and the quality is really impressive for what we need it for.
Lighting
We just have two simple softbox lights and the nice thing about these lights is they’re connected. Not connected by a cord, but by remote. You can adjust either of them solo or in sync.
You can make them brighter, or dim them down, and they even allow for you to change the temperature of the lighting. You’d be surprised what a difference this makes for your podcast and your show.
They have a colder light which has more blue tones, or a warmer light, which I have some people who come in and say they prefer a boho earthy feel so we use a softer light that feels good to them.
It’s nice to have these options that you can flex through because you’re creating a whole world around you when you’re creating your show.
Ways to use Mompreneur Co. Podcast Studio Rental
It’s been really exciting to see, over the past year, how our studio space has been used. While we’ve mostly recorded podcasts in this space, the space isn’t limited to just podcasting.
Some ways clients have used this space are:
- Recording Reels and social media content in a single room
- Hosting a content creation day with clients or friends with a full studio rental
- Using the for your branding photoshoot
- Interviewing loved ones to capture stories and voices you never want to forget
- Launching your podcast through Substack in a day
- Webinar recordings
- Team Meetings
- Hosting a mastermind, meetup or retreat
- the possibilities are endless….
One creative way this space has been used is for Reel recording. People can come here just for the day, and batch record all their content.
We’ve also hosted events here ourselves like a few different mompreneur meetups. We’ve hosted events with our alumni association from Miami University.
We love finding new creative ways to use this space, and we’re excited for you to be able to create in it too.
Ready to bring your content to life at the Mompreneur Co. Studio
Did you love this post? Pin for later!