A Basement Full of Fun

The storage rooms of yesterday’s homes are being annexed in the name of fun.

By Scott Sowers

This remodeled basement by Wentworth Studio makes the most of its tight space in historic Georgetown. The homeowners loved their home but felt it needed a guest room and an informal living area. Opening the basement space into an 18 x 24 foot family room with a drop-down Murphy bed proved to be the perfect solution.

Photograph by Rob Blunt

With all the pressures of modern life, it’s good to know that some of us have not forgotten how to have a good time. What people do to enjoy themselves is all over the map, but the ways homeowners are reconfiguring their spaces reveal a few trends.

Media rooms and home movie theaters are popular. Billiards is still a draw. Crafting can be fun, poker is cool, and the idea of having a bar in the basement is definitely in style. Thinking about adding an extra dose of fun to your house? Here’s how to begin.

“The first thing I ask is, ‘What’s the function of the room?’” says Lisa Adams of Adams Design in D.C. “Is there a ping-pong table, a trampoline, or is it a formal living room with something fun in it?” The basic question of the room’s purpose goes hand in hand with how much space you can devote to pure fun.

Whatever the activity or the size of the space, the idea of having a room set aside for fun isn’t that special anymore. “Having a home gym in the basement, a media room, or a pool room used to be considered unusual,” says Adams. “Now they’re standard.”

Harveys’ Fun House

In 1999, Christine and Donald Harvey bought a brand new home in Fairfax. Like many of us, the couple visualized their home as something beyond the place you go after work, a movement identified by Mark Richardson, president of Case Design/Remodeling Inc. of Washington, D.C. “People are seeing their homes as a retreat or a resort,” says Richardson. “The notion of being able to come home into a space you’ve set up for fun has become the ideal.”

With help from Case, the Harveys began upgrading. They started with the kitchen, which is connected to the basement by a flight of stairs. “We wanted to open up the stairs,” says Christine. “That’s where it all started. It was like a dungeon down there, excluded from the rest of the house.”

The Harveys’ basement project includes a billiards room, a home theater, a 25-foot granite bar, and a 500-gallon saltwater aquarium. “The fish were a big part of the basement,” says Christine, “but they were also the biggest obstacle. The tank had to be custom fabricated, and it weighs 800 pounds.” Although the Harveys’ home theater is state of the art and the pool table features custom-made orange felt, most of the fun happens in front of the fish.

“We do a lot of entertaining down there, lots of holiday parties,” says Christine. To keep friends and family from going hungry, the downstairs entertainment area includes a full kitchen with an oven, cooktop, refrigerator, microwave, and sink. A complete set of cabinets left over from the kitchen remodel found a new home in the basement. To finish the space, the Harveys added custom trim to make the transformed basement feel like it had always been that way.

Even with three great rooms on the lower level, there’s no debate about where the most fun can be had. “The bar,” Christine says with a laugh. “We have two rooms in this house where everybody congregates, the kitchen and the bar, because that’s where the food is.”

Rack ‘Em

Armin Bondoc works as the Design Director for Landis Construction based in Washington, D.C. A few years ago, a client came into his office with a “problem.” He had inherited a pool table.

“The driving force was the billiards table, because it wouldn’t fit in the existing basement,” says Bondoc. “It wouldn’t fit past the beam that was holding up the first floor.” The home is a large, modern townhouse in the District, and Landis had already reconfigured the kitchen and master bath upstairs.

The first step in the basement remodel was to eliminate the interior walls that were breaking up the flow. Landis painstakingly moved the support beams behind new walls and opened up the space to new possibilities. Still, the changes to the look were centered around the pool table. “They wanted the space to look a little more sleek,” says Bondoc. “The billiards table already had that with its chrome and black.”

Using the art deco-inspired pool table as a starting point, the basement makeover spilled over into the downstairs bathroom. Existing fixtures were removed and replaced by a sink with exposed chrome legs, a low-profile toilet, and chrome-framed shower enclosure. Glass tile in a 1 x 1 inch mosaic completed the transformation and was also used for a backsplash behind the wet bar and serving area.

The homeowners already owned a wine cooler, and they used it in the main room as a focal point. Oak cabinets were added to warm up the space and provide storage for party supplies. Bar stools serve as ad hoc seating.

Because the room is on the lower level, the designer also looked for ways to expand the sense of spaciousness. “The space is long,” says Bondoc, “and we wanted it to feel like one room. So we used a 12 x 24 inch ceramic tile that looks like slate for the floor and used it on the surround for the fireplace, too.”

Stereo equipment is stashed in a custom-made cabinet below the flat-screen TV, and a black marble mantel connects the fireplace with the entertainment center. The basement also holds a laundry room, a mechanical room, and an extra bedroom.

As wonderful as it is now, the room might have never been built. “If they didn’t have that billiards table, they probably wouldn’t have done this room,” says Bondoc.

Man’s Land

When Ken and Melissa Fraine bought a new home in Leesburg, Va., Ken had a vision. Like most of us, he dreamed of creating a spot in the house that he could truly call his own. It did not take him long to realize that his new basement was the perfect place to do it.

“I knew exactly what I wanted to do,” Ken says. “I’ve been collecting stuff for 10 years and dreaming of building something like thisókind of a retreat from the worldóMan’s Land.”

Ken’s version of man’s land centered on the things that he likes to do: play rugby, hoist a few pints while talking about rugby, and shoot pool while talking about rugby. His inspiration for how his space would look takes us back to the old country. “I wanted that pub feel to it,” he says, “and to have everything in there that a guy could want.”

Before Ken’s vision could be brought to life, he first had to undo some work that had been done by the builder. To put his renovation plan into action, he called on Chris Sodergren, owner of Clifton Contracting. “The homeowner told me he wanted to finish his basement, that he wanted a bar area, space for a pool table, and a fireplace,” Sodergren says, “but it evolved from there.”

Ken decided that the rough-ins for the bathroom fixtures were in the wrong spot, so the concrete floor was broken up, allowing the future bathroom to move into an out-of-the-way corner.

Ken also has contacts who do stone work, and so he brought them into the mix for a consultation. “He wanted an Irish-themed bar,” says Jeff Jones, co-owner of Custom Stonescaping in Falls Church. “He’s into rugby, so he wanted Old World style with dark paneling and rough textured stone.”

With a rough design scheme in place, the three men carved the space into a separate storage area, a men’s room, a pool room, a bar, and an entertainment center. Special touches include a stone foot rail for the bar, wainscoting throughout, and a shelf for drinks along the walls of the pool room.

Ken cites the biggest challenge on the project as “getting the ideas out of my head onto paper and then explaining it to the guys.” Despite the difficulties, he is more than happy with how the finished product turned out. “When I go in there, being behind the bar serving my friends drinks is the most relaxing thing in the whole world,” he says.

Are You Not Entertained?

A common element running through rooms designed with fun in mind is a section set aside for home entertainment. Setting up a space for watching TV or movies can be as simple as designating a nook with a television and a DVD player or as complicated as building an entirely new room. “What level of equipment you’re considering will dictate the constraints,” says designer Lisa Adams. “There’s a wide range of investments,” says Mark Richardson of Case Design and Remodeling, “so you should start with the technology and work backwards.”

The options associated with home entertainment have become so complex, an entire industry has been built to address the entertainment aspect of our homes. Tim Rooney, President and CEO of All Around Technology in Rockville spends a good deal of his time walking homeowners through the maze of choices available for home entertainment. “A media room is a far more versatile use of a basement than using it just for watching movies,” says Rooney.

The term “media room” differs from “home movie theaters” in that media rooms can use existing furniture. Home movie theaters typically use stadium seating where each row of seats is six inches higher than the next as you get farther away from the screen. Media rooms may employ more than one screen, and can use the sound that comes from the TV. Media rooms can also be outfitted with big screens, plasma screens, or LCD screens. Each room type has advantages and the price point varies. Installed systems from All Around Technology start at around $1,600 and go into the six figures.

The closest thing you can get to the cinema experience in your home is to invest in a home theater system. “A home movie theater is a dedicated space using a projected image onto a screen with high-quality sound and light,” says John Greaney, vice president of Hollywood Home Movie Theater in Herndon. Greaney likes to install his systems into rooms that are at least 16 x 20 feet with ceilings that are at least eight feet high.

His systems start at around $20,000. “It’s a theater where you can go without having drinks spilled on you or a cell phone going off,” says Greaney.

If movies are your idea of fun, this may be the option for you. If it’s pool, leave enough room for the stick work. For a weekly night of cards with the guysóor the girlsómake sure you get the right kind of table for poker. Whatever your idea of fun is, you can bet there’s a way to transform your basement into a space that’s just perfect for it.