Building A Luxury Basement With Interior Designer Sarah Richardson | Sarah Off Grid S2 E2 | Abode

paper was light gold in medieval times i want tobacco sugar [Music] that everything we thought we knew about the world might turn out to be completely wrong i'm sarah richardson along with my husband alex and our daughters robin and fiona i'm taking on a whole new off-the-grid project isn't it cute it's super cute i bought a small town heritage home and my plan is to turn it into the perfect four season rental this has to be completely demolished we're gonna tear down build up and transform this into the ultimate vacation home oh good one with tommy by my side we're a killer design duo are you kidding me as we go off the grid again [Music] my husband alex and i bought a 115 year old home in an adorable small town called creamworm this area has loads of attractions year-round but very few places for visitors to stay that's where i come in this could be a seasonal rental it could be an airbnb we're transforming this house into the perfect all-season vacation rental is that a good idea financially or not stay tuned so what do you get for 350 000 in a really tough market well it has some charm there's just so much not right inside apart from the amazing redesign i did on both guest bedrooms and the upstairs bathroom i love this with a total renault budget of four 400 000 my plan is to rejuvenate this property room by room keeping our ecological footprint to a minimum but to get this old house ready for the rental market there's still a lot of work to be done you see this edition here i think that edition needs a good smashing maybe we take down the edition and build a brand new addition on the exact same footprint but sweet make it two stories love it alex and i think it's a good idea to build a new two-story addition but what about tommy love the brick house not so much the addition what's with the silence of the lamb's door in the floor that's access for the basement oh it's like a horror film and one that does not end well it ends with sudden destruction i'm only three feet into this extension and i'm already thinking this is coming off the back of the building that was the first thing alex said was when can i get in here with my backhoe and he's just really excited you know what he wants to do he just wants to claw in and pull it off i've had an engineer come and look at this the engineer thinks we can build on the existing foundation wow that there's a huge savings there huge savings at a thousand square feet the original house is too small to accommodate groups building a new two-story addition will give us 2 000 square feet in total and a smart floor plan to maximize the space will make this property pop in a rental listing my goal is to come up with a design to give this heritage home a contemporary feel at least that's the plan i am really banking on the fact that we have an existing foundation that is dry it's concrete doesn't show any cracks looks like it's in great shape and we can just quickly put a two-story edition on top okay that's my goal my concept is let's just build a box it'll give us all the space we need it'll be affordable and efficient to build and i think once it's done it's going to look fantastic this is the ideal solution for anybody trying to get more space than they currently have and try and keep it within the confines of a reasonable budget it's demo day and the crew is here bright and early but my contractor ed has got quite the wake-up call for me so you know how excited you were about reusing this foundation yeah unfortunately we did some digging and it doesn't go very deep the foundation is basically sitting on grade like so there's no cross protection yeah pretty much at grass the engineer said it was a good solid foundation he would have had a look through the crawl space hole which was pretty dark he's seen the block foundation but he could not see depth of footings so he was assuming we had a proper foundation well this is the risk you take any time you buy a home i had an engineer stop by for an inspection but he couldn't inspect what he couldn't see so there was no way of knowing about the foundation until after we close the deal and open the floor i'm bummed about the foundation so here's my foundation as you can see it's beautiful it's dry there's no cracks i really thought we'd lucked out and in the end it's worthless so we have to remove the entire foundation dig down four feet minimum and pour a new footing and install a new foundation that's the bad news yeah that's bad news this is gonna up my budget and it's gonna take a lot more time than i planned for this edition has to come off and we start fresh not where i wanna be time to give alex the bad news it turns out there is no foundation under the audition like no good no good can't use it gotta rip it out it's completely useless we just upped our budget a fairly good chunk then correct to say that i'm concerned would be a big understatement this wasn't on the map you know this wasn't on the like this is this is the detour on the map well maybe you should invite the minister of exteriors to come and look at these things before you buy them i invited you i showed you the pictures and you were busy that day fortunately i have a plan to get us out of this mess instead of digging the minimum four feet to build a proper foundation we're going down deeper and building a fully finished basement this jacks up our budget by at least a hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars once we're done but it gives us an additional 550 square feet of living space that means more guests and increased rental value you're better off if you're gonna dig it anyway to dig it all the way down and do a basement so i say we go for it don't get me wrong i'm not thrilled about this but i think we might as well make the most of it alex is on board my plan is to turn this new basement into the ultimate media room with tons of seating where guests can entertain or relax and watch a movie with their kids as an additional attraction i'll include a bar a state-of-the-art laundry area and plenty of extra storage now that we have a solid plan for the audition it's time to do some serious subtraction say goodbye to this room it's time ready have you done this before no i haven't actually so this can be fun [Music] hey why does he get to have all the fun you gotta give it a go chuck some junk in the junk bin sure i'll chuck some junk in the bin all right take the right stick and pull it towards you it's just a left stick now there's a lot of sticks at once that's good this is 10 000 times more fun than it even looks [Music] how am i doing so far awesome i'm just gonna let you do it she's got this it doesn't need me anymore we've done our demolition we've removed the old edition and today is the day we dig okay so what's the plan here today alex uh we're gonna dig a big hole mr obvious in terms of the height of the basement we can get an eight foot basin yes we can what if i want an eight and a half foot basement i think we're pushing it because we do have water issues here okay the water table seems to be coming up okay we're getting big floods floods and rental properties not a good compound not a lot of fun not a lot of fun okay enough talk let's get digging as an added bonus we get to see more of the home's original fieldstone foundation they sure don't make them like they used to oh look we have a basement walkout we're not quite done yet but we're closed is this it uh almost right ed how how much further do we have to go right to the almost to your track you're pretty much there in that corner are you sure this feels small it seems smaller when you're in the pit i know it seems pretty big to me but oh no this designer is having some serious doubts i invested in a century-old home with a plan of turning it into the ultimate four season rental property but replacing the existing edition with a new two-story structure wasn't so simple so we have to remove the entire foundation [Music] so after knocking down the old extension we decided to dig deep to build an amazing spacious basement retreat this feels small you're exactly 30 feet to that wow so it is just as spacious as i thought well you could always have a pool or you could have a basement your choice uh i'd like an addition please that means we've got a lot to do this is icf insulated concrete farms if you've followed my other renovation projects you know i'm a big fan of icf this system uses interlocking styrofoam blocks you just stack them up fill them with concrete and it goes together fast so you can save on labor ed and alex you're gonna have this installed in a single day it's a pretty simple build three walls it's just a box no problem says you are you sure this is the right size what do you mean is it the right size i sure hope it is no but seriously it looks really small once you come on down and see for yourself maybe that will help you got a measuring tape sure we have 18 feet two inches inside the foundation that will hold one really nice pool table and a foosball table may i continue sure at some point maybe it'll feel bigger i sure hope so [Music] with the basement work going full steam ahead it's time to nail down a final design plan to ensure this basement hits all the sweet spots for vacation renters and who better to help than tommy when you look at those numbers do those numbers look too small to be a great media room so 15 foot 3 and 16 foot eight and a half yeah that's not huge when you consider that the kind of seating you need for a media room for a big family to watch tv i'm actually a little concerned that it's not huge like you i am concerned that the basement might be a little bit small but unfortunately the reality of it is the basement foundation is set and fortunately so is my floor plan so what will happen is you'll come down the stairs and we have a sump closet here so this will be enclosed and on the other side we will have a laundry room also fully enclosed okay so if you do that like a third of this basement is being used up with sump pump ew and laundry mooring we're completely gonna have to wall off that stone wall of the old foundation oh yeah we're not gonna see the stone wall but we didn't used to have a basement at all so i didn't think it was that bad can we talk about something else please we can make the most of the available space with smart furniture choices that are adaptable for lots of different uses how about if instead of doing a neutral sofa what if we did something in this room that kind of had some personality like a nice rich color i love this i actually really love this teal like anything in this family of colors feels really kind of grounded really like earthy when i'm decorating a space that's going to be used by lots of people including kids durability is what i'm looking for how about this bottle green i know you'd love a bottle i love this i think this is a great beginning we can build off of this and see what else we can find in terms of you know online furniture sourcing maybe a couple of vintage elements to throw in there then we have i think a really cozy beautiful media room right yeah now that tommy and i have a concrete design plan it's time to pour the basement floor is it going to be as spacious as i hoped oh [Music] this is way bigger than i expected i admit when you were putting the block in it felt really small this feels big to me it's not massive but it's roomy i think it's a great size room that's a relief but i don't think alex is the biggest fan of the plan tommy and i came up with look how great that wall looks sadly we're not gonna see it what well we can't have the wall exposed because we've got a sump room here i was so worried that this was a japanese toilet but i'm glad that that's a sun pump no the idea is laundry to the left some to the right i know this is the stump room and stuff instead of having a wall to wall this off so it kind of tightens the space when you come down what if we left this open and kind of built something over here that allowed kind of a lounge area over here so we could really enjoy these beautiful walls so what you're saying is change everything i came up with i wasn't really very happy when alex started changing my design plan well i'm no interior designer as you know but that would be what i would do i'll tell you what you can do i'm starting at the bottom as i transform this heritage house into a stunning all-season rental property where guests can really get off the grid oh look we have a basement walkout we have a design dilemma in the basement we can't have the wall exposed because we've got a sump room here and the laundry and storage here originally i thought that this was going to be open so we could really enjoy these beautiful walls you've got tons of good ideas for this let's think about how best to leave it to the designer okay well to be fair alex's ideas are actually pretty good a bench over the sump pump instead of an enclosed wall is pretty clever but if we really want to see more of this beautiful field stone have an even better plan i see you and i raise you a different idea what we could do is you could put a counter in at this height okay with storage underneath and this could be a bar sink with a bar fridge and some toy storage and then open above that way more of the original fieldstone will be exposed beside the laundry and the addition of a bar under the stairs will make this entertainment central for our guests would that be fun yeah i think i'm super good at this this is a very good idea do you like that idea 100 i think it's a terrific idea it makes the basement lounge better and it solves the problem of the laundry room so it does both things at once oh yeah i love it when a plan evolves thanks to some collaboration we have definitely ended up with the best overall point no doubt about it now that the basement is moving ahead i have another big mess that needs to be cleaned up [Music] there it goes a lot of scrap when i took on this project the goal was to keep our environmental footprint to a minimum with that mission in mind alex and i are taking all of this junk to the recycling depot nearby and we'll take everything that steel is going to go off on the ground here yeah and your copper brass there we're going to take in the door 3 after like every renault this project has produced a lot of potential waste but not many homeowners know that discarded steel aluminum brass and copper are all recyclable that was fun all this metal will be sorted separated and eventually melted down to produce new products it's good for the environment and great for your wallet how much is it per pound number one coffee right now is 320 a pound what yeah gold my gosh i already love purging and cleaning out do you understand this is gonna take my cleaning out to a whole new level yep all this trash has just become treasure let's find out what our trailer was worth 277 dollars yes but the single biggest way we'll save money on this off the grid project is in energy consumption alex is really hot on the idea of using solar power so the original plan was to put it on the barn but when we looked at the trees and the shading that they'll create yeah putting it on the main house on the new edition is actually the way to go because it gets the most sun okay what kind of system are we thinking about installing here because i don't really understand what you've mapped out what we want to do is generate power to offset the energy costs of the house so when it's sunny out we'll be making power yeah and then we're gonna have a battery bank in the basement which will store power in the spectrum of off-grid living yeah where would this fall so it's kind of the best of all worlds if you think about the grid as being more of like an energy bank yes so if we put in say 100 kilowatt hours of power into the grid from our solar panels we can then draw that back out when we need it say in the winter or when there's not as much solar production this sounds good how much does this cost so the solar panels are about 6 000 bucks okay installed the battery's about thirteen thousand dollars so total cost about twenty thousand dollars about twenty thousand but the great thing is because it's actually an installed capital improvement in your home yeah it increases the value of your home it makes it more attractive because your operating costs are lower that sounds like a win-win-win i think it's a it's oh yeah okay with a totally cool energy plan in place back at the house a situation is heating up i don't know what's happening here remember when tommy alex and i concocted a new foolproof design concept for the basement what if we left this open and kind of built something over here that allowed kind of a lounge area over here this is a very good idea do you like that idea 100 i think it's a terrific idea well unfortunately we didn't inform a pretty important person the plumber so none of this was supposed to be here who has inadvertently put a big old monkey wrench in our plan we're trying to keep the plumbing to go out of the house without going down into these areas because this was going to be a nice spot where you just relax and enjoy but it's looking a little more industrial than how you want it to be it doesn't look good this is going to be a pretty big deal i think more like a huge deal but why is all of this plumbing coming into the new addition well this so this is all the plumbing for the bathroom and so on i'm not sure if we can change it now great that plan is down the drain i bought a cute old home with big dreams of turning it into a fabulous four season rental the idea is laundry to the left some to the right but completing the new basement edition has been trickier than i thought but why is all of this plumbing coming into the new edition exposed plumbing is definitely not a design feature that i would highlight but i don't want to cover up the home's original fieldstone foundation with an enclosure what to do it's kind of stupid that our laundry room isn't just in there why isn't it in there the home's existing basement was cramped and difficult to access a little tight but now that ed's fixed all that if i'm not mistaken you and i are thinking the same thing dan we have a question for you what would be involved if we wanted the laundry to go where the laundry used to be it would be a matter of getting a drain pipe over there so it's not a totally big deal not a totally big deal no good enough for me this way we get more space in our media room and more exposed fieldstone great idea great idea so the moral of the story is everything works out for the best plans are really just more of a concept and an idea rather than reality but the good thing about this change order is there's not a big cost associated with it it's cutting one hole through a you know concrete wall effectively exactly but to be honest at this point i'm just glad we have a final plan [Music] [Applause] in the basement utility room the hvac installation is underway we invested in a new furnace air conditioner and hot water heater all new ductwork and plumbing high efficiency furnaces can save you up to 45 on your fuel bill plus it will be much quieter for our guests now mechanicals may not be my forte but i do have a great design idea for electrician scott i don't like the way the panel looks over there can we spin that panel so we can actually do something interesting we'll go uh vertical with it right here get this frame nice i was thinking we could frame over here for alex's solar okay all of the batteries that will store the solar power have to fit in this room along with the furnace hot water heater and laundry and i'll make it look gorgeous there'll be no wiring on your window well that window well could make a really nice folding table and then have the laundry in here somewhere we can build a wall if we need to to enclose the furnace but we've got this huge space and i want this to look cool when it's done since everything seems to be under control i'm meeting with alex to show him some of the cool furniture tommy and i chose i've been working with this room planner which allows us to bring in a photo well so this is an app and you've got the photo of the basement in there yeah this is a photo that i took you can choose from a whole bunch of stock photos or you can just import one of your own photos and then that's cool before we hit go on all our purchases i just thought it'd be fun to see how they look in the room well i like that one for watching movies with the headrest that's super neat isn't that awesome these are all items that i've saved to think about and you can pull just you just pull it over yeah watch basically the way i look at this this is sort of a try before you buy situation which of these two media units do you like this is really cool it's got a black wrap with a horizontal near front and then this one is walnut that runs vertically i think i like this one that runs horizontally okay so let's see how that's gonna look and then these are fun because all these ottomans and stools you can move them around and it's nice to have uh the flexibility that you can move stuff around the space kind of has everything it has anything you want look you want a bar fridge love it does the app actually have ping pong tables sure it does really yeah wow okay well uh try me yeah all right i'll see you in a few minutes alex is down with our furniture picks but that furniture can't just sit on bare concrete the time has come to talk about and think about and select about our basement flooring right on the upper levels of the house we have selected a really beautiful engineered hardwood so it's a european white oak and it's lovely it's gorgeous right now why not just do that everywhere i think this is a place where kids are supposed to be able to play and run like wild savages the key here is the durability so we could definitely use what we're using on the main floor or we can use the material that i think will be even better it's durable water resistant family friendly easy to clean vinyl you want to do a vinyl floor in the basement yup you know how i feel about fake things i don't love fake floors fake boobs fake people okay we always like natural materials whenever possible for everything the reason i think that the vinyl is interesting is because of a number of factors the engineered wood is five times the price we have ten dollars for engineered wood and this vinyl is about two dollars a square foot i think the price point is amazing and the way this floor gets installed it literally clicks together no glue no nails nothing i'm a little skeptical though because here's the thing the vinyl may look exactly like the wood but underfoot vinyl feels different than wood if you want something that's durable long lasting affordable easy to install and still looks good i think that's tick tick tick tick tick vinyl makes sense in the basement i'm still skeptical i'm just as optimistic about an unconventional pick for the basement wallpaper okay this just in mock-up the new wallpaper book i'm such an optimist i always believe that everything's gonna work out so look at these colors right this is fun when i design i'm thinking about how a space is going to be used oh look at this one but isn't it cool it's amazing i'm going with a light tone for the media room walls it will go with my color scheme and keep the space feeling airy and bright i don't just design spaces to look pretty i designed them for life spring is in the air and i'm feeling very good about how our fresh start basement build is proceeding kremor is hosting a vintage sale this weekend so i'm taking advantage of fiona and robin's spring break to clean up the barn come on girlies and hopefully sell off some of the potential treasures that have accumulated during our reno so here's the plan during a renovation we've saved everything that we've taken out and i'm thinking that something like this what do you think somebody might do with this put it in their house they might turn it into a mirror right so people like these kind of things so we'll have to think about what we could sell that for as an added bonus alex and i are gonna let them keep the cash how excited are you about this this yes let's do it go go team recycle that's looking good looking good i'd stop there we're separating the junk from the hidden jewels anything that's garbage we can throw away so we need to get that piece of trellis down because we'll sell that what did we decide on this edge there's enough of this that maybe we can find a project for it you can throw those these get recycled uh i think so i am seriously impressed with my kids today what do you think wow it was hot and dusty and we literally cleaned it all out they worked so hard and hopefully they'll see just how much it pays off it's the day of the vintage festival this event brings out a lot of salvage hunters robin your signs are awesome i like this 70s barbecue 25 crossed out five dollars that's a good deal don't you think i think my girls have inherited some of my entrepreneurial skills okay yep two of those we just sold seven windows guys and to think that all these great finds could have ended up in the dump when it comes to being eco-friendly fun and fun to go hand-in-hand just ask my girls how much money did you make at the sale 400 no the girls rewarded themselves with a trip to the toy store but we can't have enough without a doubt back at the house there's a serious situation that's brought everything to a halt i feel a bit rattled today on every job there's something that falls through the cracks and i think we've hit our first sort of scheduling snag during the basement build the crew has been using a temporary set of stairs but now we need to install the permanent ones it turns out that nobody has ordered our stairs yet and custom stairs take at least three weeks to make the stairs need to be painted the railings need to be installed the bar the bar sink the cabinetry all needs to be installed to the stairs the stairs should have been ordered four weeks ago and they should be in we are at a complete standstill [Music] getting this 115 year old property ready for the rental market has had plenty of ups and a lot of downs like our new basement the stairs should be going in now but they're not it turns out that nobody has ordered our stairs yet this is a huge snafu stairs normal all fouled up my schedule is in serious jeopardy so i'm meeting with alex and my assistant brianna to see if we can brew up some kind of solution i would love a double espresso do you want that with milk yeah okay what do you want regular black coffee okay so the stairs for the basement are not ordered they were never ordered so the team that normally does them is going to be at least three weeks by the time they sight measure so there's one team that could get them i think measured today and installed in a week are you nervous that you haven't used the company before yes i am but well i mean how much could they screw it up the problem is you want sugar with yours little oh darling the easy part is that it's a straight run right but it has to fit perfectly so my question do we wait for the company that we've worked with before because we know that the results are clear they're great they're amazing or do we take a chance and go with people that can do it quickly but we've never worked with them before we really don't have time these stairs are kind of holding back a bunch of stuff right because we've got a whole bunch of work to do in the basement we've got appliances coming you think we go with the unknown whatever gets us to the finish line on time totally i don't think we have a choice if only completing the basement was as easy as making coffee while work on our media room is at a standstill i'm focusing my design eye on the new laundry area since this home is going to be off the grid i want to make it as eco-friendly as possible so i invested in a high efficiency washer and dryer they're a little more expensive than traditional units but they also use up to 80 percent less water and hold up to 40 percent more clothes that means i can offer our guests laundry facilities without worrying that it's going to break the bank [Music] we're putting in a customized butcher block countertop and this totally cool sliding barn door i hope alex loves it as much as i do i love doors that roll they're so good right you can leave the door open yeah and you can look through from the media room and i want it to read as though it's new house but actually we're in the old house yeah look great folding counter yeah then we took the leftover scraps and we turned them into a shelf so you can fold and stack it up we even used our scraps of butcher block and we've made an amazing counter in the window this totally feels like stolen space you've got such good ideas and the best part is they're not impossible to pull off there's always bends and twists and you just got to kind of roll with it you know fly fans your lemons make some pretty kick-ass lemonade i say so i would say this is the optimal result well done thank you darling thank you thank you thank you well hold on i thought i was going to get a smooch or something out of that come on now you got to help me unpack the sideboard first making me work now i'm going to put my foot down let's go come on move it i knew he'd love it and you know what i love that the new stair manufacturers delivered on their promise the new stairs have arrived they're in they look nice so we've got paint grade stringers and then we can either paint or stain the treads and the risers they don't feel like they're crowding the space at all super sturdy and even better there are 2 500 all in but i still need to get them to code instead of installing a standard railing i've come up with a creative idea to dampen sound and help bring more natural light into this media room so i was hoping we could do something in glass because that way we'll get maximum light flowing in it'll look contemporary clean could we do a full like a wall here of glass there's gonna be a family room here with a tv and some sound so we want to keep that sound down here yeah and we'll just build the glass right up to the top so it's just one glass wall here nice so on this side we're gonna do a 42 inch railing yeah instead of right up to the ceiling okay all the hardware will be in black in terms of hardware so is it basically any plating any powder coating absolutely yeah okay i may stick with black cause it's classic but um okay that sounds good really good but at ten thousand dollars this was definitely a splurge but i'm saving big time on what's being installed next the vinyl flooring i want to get this foreign how long is it going to take to install this floor 10 minutes well aren't we a tad optimistic for many homeowners laying vinyl flooring can be done as a diy no adhesives or nails needed tommy wasn't crazy about my choice but i know he'll be floored when he sees it all laid down are you kidding me are you kidding me hold on hold on how long has it been it's been under an hour or like an hour i i'm going to say an hour and done insane like look at this there is no seams no scenes you can't feel anything and it doesn't it doesn't move no bevels it's really really nice-looking do we love this we love this i knew tommy would come around but i still need to come up with an inventive idea to spiff up these basement walls i've been trying to think for a long time with the right solution for this media room is how do i make it contemporary but how do i make it interesting how do i give it texture how do i make it feel different than any other room and it literally hadn't come to me until i saw this pile of leftover barn board there's enough of this that maybe we can find a project for it yep thanks to the barn cleanup these repurposed boards will add a fabulous flourish creating the illusion of paneled walls the way to be green is to use up everything you've got to try and make sure that there's no waste that's what i'm doing here what if we take the garbage and turn it into glory paired with textured wallpaper between the repurposed panels this easy inexpensive addition will give this room some architectural interest sarah style can i see it on this site carpenter charlotte's not completely on board with my paneling plan yet she thinks we should just do the vertical strips to create the panels and i asked her to show me one horizontal going across the top to finish it off so she clearly likes it better without and i like a better width charlotte and i are having a debate piece across the top or no piece across the top no peace i don't think so i'm sorry i think it needs to panel really well because hardwood delivers quality and attention to detail is the trim right so in an old house you'd have crown molding finishing details and just sometimes it's contemporary okay i know you don't want to do it charlotte's another skeptic who will be blown away when this is finally finished i bought a heritage home in the tiny town of primor the plan to transform it into the ultimate four season rental property what i didn't plan was how much work it was gonna be there's always bends and twists and you just gotta kind of roll with it you know is this it we started at ground zero of our new two-story addition and after weeks of disappointments compromises and multiple redesigns my vision for the basement media room is finally seeing the light of day [Applause] okay now hold on a second here you never told me about the glass what a great idea isn't that looking good it's actually not that bright outside but there's a lot of light streaming it the idea was hand rail on one side glass wall on this side that way if you're watching something down here all the noise isn't going to go up brilliant i know we've got this great skylight you know it's amazing i'm impressed really sarah has taken this to a whole new level and i'm not even done yet inside chris is raising the bar on basement entertaining while outside our furniture has arrived [Music] ah fits like a glove thanks to my virtual walkthrough this is sort of a try before you buy situation [Music] my idea of adding wood paneling and textured wallpaper will give this media room a unique character without blowing my budget great hello daisy would you like me to show you around the green attributes of this room this is actually extra sighting from outside now my favorite part of finishing touches take me out maybe just drop them as opposed to throw them don't take out all your frustrations on me so are we gonna grip these four as a coffee table yeah i just thought they'd kind of love that or whatever right but what's a media room without one of these you think the girls are going to think this is big enough that's a giant massive there we go yeah i don't think that's going anywhere and we're finally done oh how far we've come this journey started with a really bad day i'll never forget when ed said to me um there's no foundation so we have to remove the entire foundation and install a new foundation but this serious setback forced me to rework my plan for the two-story edition and build this amazing new basement media room and the reward is amazing when you look around and see what came of that bad day the decisions the solutions the creative approaches get you this imagine if we'd gone with the original plan and been able to use the original foundation on that edition yeah we never would have had this space and i literally cannot imagine this house without this level every single decision about the mood and the character of this room stems from this stone wall i think it's so cool when you look at the stone wall it all feels like it's rooted in its place and it's drawn from such a natural inspiration that's what i like the laundry room landed exactly where it was meant to be it has all of the modern conveniences that modern life demands in terms of functionality in a laundry room yeah to stay in the theme of keeping it green i recycled as many materials as possible for the walls i used leftover lumber to create this custom paneled look and added contemporary textured wallpaper i love this wallpaper amazing it's a stunning combination of something that feels very contemporary and something that has that texture which links it to the past it's the right choice it's 100 the right thing we have this amazing click together floor that is indestructible it feels to me like at the beginning we chose the vinyl because we thought it was the affordable choice and now i feel like it's actually also the right design choice i can't believe how much i like it if you had said to me and i hadn't seen it we're putting in a vinyl floor i would have been like what like it would have been like a betty davis movie i think it's time to elevate this beyond the basement this whole show should be a love letter to this floor but not everything was my idea alex's comfy corner nook was constructed at a fraction of the price of a custom piece and our new glass enclosed staircase keeps the sounds in the media room while simultaneously increasing the amount of light that floods into the basement the glass was really the splurge down here but i also feel that it's the defining moment you know it's the thing that says this is contemporary and i love that you see through that contemporary moment to the old wall right so great so open the fact that we were able to sneak in this bar yeah i mean you don't have to go for the wet bar but it's nice to have an additional sink on this level because there isn't one in the laundry room the bar gives us great storage and makes the most of this otherwise awkward space under the stairs you really need the flexibility so having the sectional wrapping around the second hair is so chic like it's so stylish i think what's so great is any of the furniture in this room can so easily be rearranged pull the chairs back all the little ottomans in the middle are so lightweight and the kids can play an interactive media game or a mom can do yoga yeah you know just by moving this lightweight furniture out of the way [Music] i have been so glad that we found this house for the price we paid to start with yep there were a lot of obstacles along the way but this new basement space adds huge value to this home 500 square feet is a lot of living space it is here's another question for you yeah why have we been standing at this bar for so long without having a glass of wine [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Abode

Views: 182,770

Keywords: Full episode, Home improvement, Renovation, Interior design, Home Makeover, Luxury Home, abode, best interior design ideas 2021, home renovation process, professional interior designer, sarah richardson, sarah richardson off the grid, building a basement bar, building a cinema room in a basement, ultimate cinema room, luxury home cinema room, detached house renovation, heritage home, heritage home transformation, building a rental property, renting my house, home cinema

Id: 1MeGf-IqBfg

Length: 43min 42sec (2622 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 30 2021