How to place or fulfill work orders for Player Housing decor

Let’s say you’ve gotten settled into your nice new house in World of Warcraft. It’s not that big of a stretch — while the feature officially goes live with the launch of Midnight next March, it seems to be going over like gangbusters with the early access crowd. You’re relaxing on your comfy sofa, tinkering with the floorplan, or turning your spiky little Horde hut into something not very hut-like at all, and you think to yourself — you know what would go great here? That corner would be perfect for the ominous, spooky ambience you can only get from the floating Tome of Maldraxxian Rituals. But browsing the housing catalog in-game won’t show you a source, like an achievement, a vendor, or a dungeon boss. That means, more than likely, that it’s crafted — but as you correctly guessed, that tome requires Shadowlands Inscription, and you’re no scribe. What’s an enterprising skeleton-loving decorator to do?

As it turns out, Blizzard has quietly slipped furniture into the work orders that you can place for almost all the professions. This is one of the first times we’ve seen items added like this where the end result isn’t soulbound, but it’s a very welcome one, because there’s such a vast array of crafted furniture that it’s fantastic to be able to lean on the experience of your friends, your guild, or even the general public. There are a few things to keep in mind when placing those orders, though, that might be slightly different than what you’re used to when upgrading your weapon.

How to place work orders for decor for Player Housing

To start, you’ll want to head to an NPC who can help you place crafting orders — for most folks during early access, that’s going to be Clerk Gretal in Dornogal. Once inside, you’ll really want to make sure you know the name of the item you want, because all of the decor is lumped together under a single category: Housing Decor, then Furnishings. (Does this seemingly-unnecessary subcategory mean there will be other things we can place orders for beyond furnishings in the future?)

A couple caveats. First, you’ll want to make sure that the item you want isn’t made with Cooking. While our list of early access crafted furniture did turn up a few recipes that require Cooking to make, like the delectable Valdrakken Blossomfruit Patter or the extremely unique Caramel Mint Noodle Dish, right now there is no way to open a panel from a campfire or cooking table to complete work orders for Cooking! This means if you want those Caramel Mint Noodles, you’ll be doing that yourself. Also, why would you do that to yourself?

Second, either you or the player who fills the work orders is going to need lumber. Lumber is everywhere, and easy (if tedious) to gather, but it’s required for literally everything in the decor system, as far as I can tell — and it’s expansion-specific, to boot. Want to decorate the outside of your house with a Sandfury Diplomat’s Banner? That’s a Battle for Azeroth recipe, you’ll need to head to Zandalar or Kul Tiras and gather Darkpine Lumber. The Maldraxxian Ritual Tome from the beginning of this post is from Shadowlands, so of course that requires some Arden Lumber. This does feel a little silly — show me which part of the Draenei Smith’s Anvil is made of Olemba Lumber, please — but it’s a part of all decor crafts, so better sharpen that axe.

How to fulfill work orders for decor for Player Housing

Luckily, fulfilling work orders is just as straightforward — head to your profession’s crafting table, click the Work Orders tab, and fill the open work order. Everything we said above about lumber applies here, too; be especially aware when answering public orders that many people are expecting the crafter to have the lumber and to provide a sizable tip instead. It’s not a bad way to make a chunk of change, but be observant: don’t let yourself accidentally get caught using your own wood for an underpaying customer! It takes time to gather that wood, and as our friends the goblins always tell us, time is money, friend.

You’ll likely want to get the recipes ahead of time that you have access to, so that you aren’t caught without one when an order comes in. Our list of every profession-crafted decor item should give you a head start, but keep in mind that some things will have costs that aren’t just monetary for you to learn the recipe — for example, learning how to make an Orcish Felblood Cauldron, a Warlords of Draenor recipe, will cost you a Secret of Draenor Alchemy, which costs you 5 Frostweed and requires an Alchemy Hut in your Garrison. Turns out it really was a good idea to return to your Garrison to prepare for Player Housing!