Basement Reno - the {almost} finished product

Ok, I'm a bit late posting this but the important thing is - it's here! The basement is pretty much done, and we are SO happy with it. All that's left is to get radiators installed (we decided to go with new, slim Stelrads) and then furnish the space.

As a reminder, you can see what the basement looked like before here, and in progress here.

Behold....the finished basement...

Bottom of the stairs and the door leading to cold storage.

 A closet we added (yay extra storage!) and door leading to the boiler room, bathroom and the laundry room (none of which were updated / touched)

Stairs, painted with porch paint

Closet and eventual "office" area

Since it's a basement and the height is just over 6 feet, we had to use flat doors and have them cut to size. The Mr. had the idea to add trim to the doors to make them more "finished". A simple change that makes a big impact! I wanted large pulls instead of typical door knobs; I think the style suits us and looks much more custom than flat doors.

We are really happy with how everything turned out - from the flooring to the doors to the paint colour (you NEVER know, especially in a basement how paint will turn out). Note that we hired someone to do the work for us - with Owen transitioning to 1 nap a day it would have taken us years to be able to finish it on our own ;) Even with hiring someone, the reno was pretty budget friendly, with most items sourced from big box stores. See below for sources - now for the exciting part, to furnish it!

Flooring - Beaulieu Kamina Oak, HomeDepot

Baseboards, shoe moulding - Lowe's

Paint (trim and doors) - Designer White (Behr); Home Depot

Paint (walls) - Moth Gray at 90% (Behr); Home Depot

Basement reno progress

The basement reno is in progress - it's so exciting when they hang the drywall and you can see a room take shape! It's actually verrrryyyy near the end but I'm going to save the full details for later...

As you can see, we didn't dig down. We have about 6' clearance, and the Mr. happens to be 6', so we are good. :) In all seriousness though, we didn't really want to get into underpinning and digging down just to gain a few inches. I think it's worth it if you're gaining 6 inches or more...and we just didn't need that much more height (or cost, or work). The purpose of this space will be a play area for Owen, a TV area, and a desk. All things you will be sitting for, so the extra height wasn't worth it to us at this point.

Already with the pot lights it is SO much brighter, and the drywall makes it feel like a room. Stay tuned for exciting changes like paint and flooring!!

Another reno - it's basement time!

I started my mat leave with a project (tile and baseboards) and I will lead out with a project (although this one better be done wellllll before I go back to work in October!)

We are pretty excited to renovate our basement - shortly after having Owen we realized just how much stuff these little guys use/need/get...and to keep the disaster that is currently our main floor at bay as Owen grows up, we decided we should finish our basement. Here are some photos of the space (sorry for the crappy pics - it's a dark basement so I didn't waste my time trying to make it look better than it is!)

This will be where the couch lives...

 To the back left is the bathroom...

The closet under the stairs is staying as a closet, and we will have a desk where the filing cabinet is.

Aside from this main room we have a laundry room at the back, a room where the boiler is, and cold storage. We are only renovating the main room into a rec room / play room / office. A lot to put in one space, yes but we think it's doable. Oh, and add storage. Obviously.

Here is a very very very rough sketch of what we are looking to do:

The height of our basement is a bit over 6 feet, so we aren't digging down. This will be a space to lounge and a space for kids so we don't feel that we need to go to the added cost of digging down for a few inches. I can't wait for better light down there and usable space.

This will be the first project in the whole house that we will not be touching (no demo, no drywall, etc...just painting it at the end).

Have you renovated your basement? Any must have's? Any lessons learned?