Basements in the Time of Corona

In the first picutre, I ordered full plywood sheets, 12", 8", 6", and 2" pieces.  Once I got home, I realized that I totally forgot to get the 8".  I took this pic as evidence of what I unloaded and Shurway was super nice about me picking up the remainder.  The second photo is the first bits of plywood up with Masonite lower backing for the cabinets, and a couple mid-walls to support shelving.

Ah, pandemic.  Should I be dragged into the abysmal pit of despair or discover a new wellspring of creativity by the isolation you've forced upon us?  Or, should I get to task to all those home improvements that have been growing on the list like ripe hops?  Well, I like hops and I like projects so you can guess what I've been busy doing.  

This post is a bit backwards chronologically since this is the latest of the works-in-progress but since they were the first photos available, I'll go with it.  I have to say dealing with the housebound nature that has been caused by COVID-19 has not been fun but it has been productive.  A bit of a throwback to when I needed to quickly make sure we had a room to house the Trusty Assistant once it was clear he (and we) thought it was time for his own space.  This has been Phase III 1/2 in the basement remodel.  Phase I being the bedroom, Phase I 1/2 being the cabinets to store all the random crap we do and don't need, and Phase II 1/2 being the toilet (to borrow the European meaning of the word and not "bathroom" which is fairly misleading when you think about it).  Phase III 1/2 is the family gathering place, the central library, the board game mecca, and, in preparation for the teen-years, the spill over area for friends to crash.  

Unfortunately, with the timing and nature of this project, creating this with a  recycled/ repurposed/ reinvented intention was going to be very difficult and time consuming and who's kidding themselves, no one wants to do that to themselves especially when you can't escape your own project once in a while.  While this first phase of Phase III 1/2 is pretty much just more shelving, it also included framing in some more walls with accompanying wiring and let's face it, the built-ins are really the main focus here so after this, the rest pretty passé. Well, the secret door will be fun but I'm not quite there yet.  

For this project, I had to remove the old shelving (supposedly for file box retention), scrape and insulate the concrete brick walls, and then put up some interior stud walls. 

Next was a trip to Shurway Lumber and selecting the wood for the built-in shelves.  I have to say I like their prices on hardwood lumber.  I'm no professional and they carry pretty decent lumber for the price, most have small defects which is perfect for any of my projects since they're usually slightly defective too!  I settled on alder since it was one of the lighter woods I could get and pricewise was very attractive.  I thought about considering the beech that I used on the back wall (see previous post) but they didn't have the dimensional lumber that I wanted and would've cost me probably twice what I ended up paying.  Everything was sanded but raw wood so there was a lot, I say a lot, of time spent staining, waiting, varnishing, waiting, sanding, varnishing, waiting, sanding, varnishing, waiting...you get the picture.  And because this is an old house with weird tilts, shrinkages, expansions, skews, and generally chaotic old-houseyness, most pieces needed to be custom cut for their particular place in the plan.

I did put some adjustment peg space in for raising and lowering shelf heights but kept it fairly minimal so that I didn't have shelf sides that looked they were attacked by woodpeckers.  I also designed the bottom cabinets (they may eventually get doors) to fit the tremendous LP collections we received from family and a few of our own recent additions.  It's been fun to have a working turn-table back in rotation (ha, I didn't even plan that one!)  There are still a few pieces of front trim to cut and then some crown-moulding to cover the big gap at top but after this, it's on to adding a small bookcase on the back wall, re-venting the heat duct, then drywalling it in, putting up the dart board (20 years later), and finally enjoying a nice gathering space for family and friends.  You know, whenever that can actually take place again.