Basement Redo - Media Room

shannahan · 02-02-2009, 12:25 AM

We bought the house we now live in about 6 and a half years ago. It has a good structure but was still stuck in 1978 which is when it was built. It has a full basement with walkout on one side. the way it was done one room at the bottom of the stairs was really not good for any real use. I used it as an office until recently then took advantage of its lack of windows and made it a tv room. Small room (about 12 X 11 plus a little)

First I furred the walls up to square things up and to insulate. I did not start to take pictures until after the walls were rocked , taped , textured and painted. My wife an I did all the above ourselves i think it looks darn good. We are very nearly done with this project just a few things to do on the media cabinet

For the media cabinet I re purposed some bathroom cabinets pulled from a house before they tore it down to develop the land. the first pic is of the two cabinets installed with out the door it has the top built the top built but not tiled yet. it seemed a little high at first but considering that we exchange the 26 inch TV on there now for nothing larger than a 42 because we sit a little over 6 feet from the tv it works perfectly. I hinged the panels at the top of the cabinets (where a drawer would go) and built keyboard drawers behind them, one for the keyboard for the media center computer and the other holds my sons game console (although he took that to college so it is empty) they are also good or remotes. I installed the cabinets a few feet apart and built shelves between them. The shelves and the bottom all remove so this could become a desk.

cocobolo · 02-02-2009, 12:32 AM

Hi there: When you get the cabinet all done up with the TV in place, can you show us another pic?
I don't think I would complain too much about a 12 x 11 room, that's not so bad. Actually a pretty common size for a second or third bedroom. And just about perfect for your media room.

shannahan · 02-02-2009, 12:38 AM

This pic shows the media room cabinet almost finished. just hardware and final touch ups to the paint (kids) the cabinets were originally glossy finished wood grain, becasue this did not even resemble what we wanted here we found a great primer that covered that and allowed us to paint without sanding more than a little. We tiled the top and did all the finish work ourselves, you can tell by the various little flaws but I think over all it looks great.

To the right of the cabinet I had various features I needed to cover and needed a place for the heater so i built the box basically 8 inches out from the wall. I was able to install into it a built in set of shelves for DVD's, etc. for the shelves on the left of this cabinet the lower one are only half deep (with mirrors on the back behind these is the electric plug, phone Ethernet and cable jacks all completely hidden.

cocobolo · 02-02-2009, 12:46 AM

That was fast. Only 13 minutes (the time between your posts) to do all that work! Pretty slick.

shannahan · 02-02-2009, 12:53 AM

Yes indeed I am quick.

Actually this room took quite some time and is still not one hundred percent as I only get weekends and had several months when I did not even get weekends. so of course these are all old pics now. have moved on to other areas of the house. will be posting the downstairs bathroom next which I am currently in the middle of.

cocobolo · 02-02-2009, 01:05 AM

Glad to see you have a sense of humor! Looking forward to seeing the bathroom pics.