From Dank to Smooth Brooklyn Workplace

A designer transforms her dank downstairs right into a gleaming artistic zone with renovation assist from Sweeten

• Owners: Inside designer Danielle Fennoy posted her trendy basement transform on Sweeten
• The place: Stuyvesant Heights, Brooklyn, New York
• Main renovation: A basement turns right into a designer’s dwelling workplace (together with laundry and storage) with gallery appears to be like
• Sweeten common contractor
• House owner’s quote: “By Sweeten, I met some skilled common contractors. We selected a contractor who appeared most succesful and most excited concerning the job. The cherry on high: He was insanely simple to work with.”

Submit your challenge on Sweeten totally free and make your dream renovation a actuality. Sweeten simplifies dwelling renovation by connecting owners with top-rated common contractors, dealing with the vetting course of and challenge administration. To study extra about how we might help, try our dwelling renovation providers.

Written in partnership with Sweeten home-owner Danielle. “After” photographs by Miao Jiaxin for Sweeten.

An unwelcoming basement

Proud. Calm. Organized. It was arduous to think about a visit all the way down to our cellar—a darkish, dank area that I by no means needed to set foot in—summoning these emotions. However renovating this area into a completely functioning basement gave us a devoted workspace for my enterprise whereas including a whole flooring of dwelling area to our dwelling. It additionally glad some severe storage wants and gave us an occasional visitor room for household visits.

We reside in a three-family Brooklyn brownstone constructed within the early 1900s. We’ve owned it for three-and-a-half years. I’m Danielle, proprietor of Revamp Inside Design (Instagram: @revampnyc); Jevaun is my husband and a design director; Zidane is our son and Katara is our canine. We occupy the parlor, backyard, and cellar ranges of the constructing, and the highest flooring are rental models. 

Since we purchased the place, now we have been redoing it one part at a time, and this was the final of the most important tasks. We needed to do a renovation within the basement, which the earlier proprietor had by no means refinished after a flood years in the past. It wasn’t in nice form: the drywall had been ripped out to forestall mould, and the room had no air flow or pure mild. Junk was accumulating down there. The laundry space was approach within the again, and we (I) needed to stroll by hell to do a load. It was unhappy.

Group for a basement transform

The area wanted to develop into a wonderful workhorse of an workplace. However it needed to perform, too, as a regular basement and retailer our household’s issues in an organized approach. We wanted locations for coats, instruments, baggage, and linens. I got here up with this gallery thought with a contemporary, open look, and we posted our basement transform challenge on Sweeten. I needed one wall to retain the uncovered masonry, for texture and grit. For the flooring, I deliberate to pour an epoxy layer over the prevailing concrete. My working joke: If I might stroll by the basement barefoot, mission completed! 

Discovering new common contractors

I work within the renovation enterprise, so I initially bid out the job with contractors I’ve labored with. However they have been all tied up with tasks. I didn’t need to have competing deadlines. By Sweeten, I met some skilled common contractors. We selected a contractor who appeared most succesful and most excited concerning the job. The cherry on high: He was insanely simple to work with. 

My working joke: If I might stroll by the basement barefoot, mission completed! 

Lighting takes centerstage

The objective was to make it brilliant and spacious. Once we moved in, our imaginative and prescient included a den and visitor bed room within the basement. Then I began having this recurring (and prescient!) dream by which I used to be working from dwelling, and the conversion plan shifted: I needed to show it right into a design gallery and studio. I wanted a workspace with a giant, open floor to work with supplies and evaluation giant drawings. Due to this, lighting can be key. Colour is a giant a part of what I do and it felt important to have a brilliant, clean canvas because the backdrop for my work.

I knew that lighting was the side of the redo that will have probably the most influence. We put in 18 recessed LED ceiling lights; there was not a darkish nook within the room. Susan Chan, a specialist at Feng Shui Inventive (Instagram: @fengshuicreative) and a pal, really helpful I add “uplighting”—fixtures that direct the sunshine upwards—to elevate the room’s vitality. I believed she was loopy and couldn’t assume easy methods to make that work—the ceilings are barely eight ft excessive. However boy, was she proper! The attractive pendant fixture I selected made an enormous distinction within the area, including each range to the sunshine and focus over the island.

Epoxy flooring for a classy basement transform

After we cleared out the stuff, the crew sheetrocked the partitions and poured the epoxy flooring. The uncovered masonry wall didn’t prove as naturally lovely as we’d hoped it might, however we went with it. The contractors constructed out closets beneath the steps, put in a storage island for a piece floor, and hung plenty of open shelving. We painted the partitions, flooring, and stairs in an ideal white—not too cool, not too heat. The furnishings plan was the hardest half. I discover a “bonus room”—an every little thing area with 10,000 features—the toughest to get proper for my shoppers, and it was no totally different for me. I created a wide-open room and didn’t need the issues I put in it to make it really feel cramped.

Attending to the end line

Because the room got here collectively, our contractor stopped by typically, checking on progress and clarifying particulars. He gave me a six-week challenge schedule. The basement transform was completed the day he promised. The standard setbacks occurred—development delays, order lags—and our challenge had surprises, however the crew saved tempo and we didn’t go over funds. 

Wanting on the completed challenge, I’ve so many favourite bits, starting with the added area. Every flooring of the constructing is about 900 sq. ft, so we elevated usable area by 50 p.c—we now have 2,700 sq. ft. The easiest reward downstairs: the right lighting. I can work across the clock and by no means know what time it’s. I jokingly name it Vegas!

Thanks for sharing your trendy basement renovation story with us, Danielle, Jevaun, and Zidane! 

Able to renovate? Begin the journey right here totally free!

Right here you possibly can study extra about our providers and places. Alternatively, browse extra dwelling renovation inspirations, processes, and value guides.  

Useful resource Supplies:

BASEMENT RESOURCES: Merely White paint: Benjamin Moore. Epoxy flooring: Sourced by common contractor. Recessed Lights: WAC Lighting. Tracer Loop pendant: Luke Mild Co. BL Pole shelving system: Rakks.