Pay special attention to my return duct in the way of the stairs and the pile of crap on the floor. Also notice the plumbing and electrical conduit lines underneath the joints through the middle of the space. It will be lovely rerouting this. I greatly look forward to this endeavor... Also, as we go forward please be patient with my adjustment of the space to make sure it
Here you can see the overall space and the new doors to the gas meter (it says "water meter", but I screwed up), the door to the water heater (I actually got this right). To the right side of this door is the furnace. On the right side is the new door back to the unfinished portion of the basement. Planning around the many obstacles is creating dead areas, and the fun part is figuring out ways to minimize these areas to maximize usable floor space. For instance, to use the space to the left of the stairs underneath the return vent that juts 24" below the joist I've thought about adding a bar counter high enough to add some glasses and a mini fridge.
I'm not sure what else I can do with this low space, other than adding a wine rack or something of the like. Also take a peek to the left to see where I put the couch, which is a way to use the 5'-6" height underneath the supply vent without eating into the space. I put it on this side of the house as I want a chaise or an L shaped couch and the new closet for the
The custom built-ins would create extra work for me and while I probably wouldn't get them 100% right it would allow me some good practice. The bad news about this is it would pretty much take up this whole wall. With the door to the gas meter where it is I'm not sure what else I could really put in this area though. In this view I also added a notional space for a closet in the dead space between the stairs and the unfinished portion of the basement. This could serve as a good space to hang winter/summer clothes during the off season, and since the space is so narrow I'm not sure what else I could use it for... One layout I'm considering for resale purporses is to create a space separate from the stairs that I can market as a bedroom in the future.
Making a wall here creates a deadspace at the bottom of the landing. While I can fill part of this space with a closet, it really chops up the space. That said, a chopped up space that creates an extra bedroom in a two bedroom house is something that deserves consideration.
Well, now that you've seen the space what are your thoughts? It would be nice to hear some opinions on how you would configure the space. I'm not sold on any specific design and am curious to hear peoples' opionions. Please help! :-)
