Clap along if you feel like happiness is the truth…because I’m HAPPY! Beckett declared that our family song a few months back, and it seems the perfect anthem for today’s One Room Challenge reveal post because we are one HAPPY family!
Scott and I are happy that we made it to the finish line, the under stairs playroom is done, and we can sleep! The boys are happy because, well… wouldn’t you be if this were your space?!
This former storage space under the basement stairs hardly qualifies as a room – a 12.5 foot long, 3 foot wide former storage space under our stairs. In just five weeks time we’ve transformed the space into one pretty incredible under stairs playhouse for our two young boys (Beckett, 3 and Cooper, almost 2).
Here’s what the space looked like when we started… it was nothing more than a poorly utilized storage space.
Emptied out, you can get a better sense of just how long and thin it is.
We brainstormed so many different ways to turn this space into an under the stairs play space, and we ultimately resisted the urge to turn this narrow hideout into a preschool fantasy land with a typical little boy theme that the boys would quickly outgrow.
Instead we created a colorful, rock & roll inspired “studio” where the boys can make music, play, and be creative for many years to come!
You can read the whole back story in my planning post, but two things you should know: (1) the plans for an under stair playroom date all the way back to my childhood; and (2) our boys never knew this space existed until last night – it was a complete surprise!
I’ll tell you more as we go along, but first, Beckett and Cooper have a question for you…
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Without further ado… Welcome to Beckett and Cooper’s under stairs music studio!
We wanted the boys to have a sense of privacy in this space {they love to close doors}, but we still want to be able to keep an eye on them, so Scott and his dad cut the door down to turn it in to a Dutch door with only the lower half installed.
Once the door is open, you get a full view of the room in all of its glowing glory! We lined the edges of the room in LED rope lighting, and lighted red carpet rugs that would make any kid feel like a rock star!
I need to send a huge thanks to the two incredible companies that sponsored portions of this room, Ikea Centennial and Command Brand! Ikea provided us with most of the products you see on the gallery wall, and Command provide us with hundreds of Picture Hanging Strips to allow us to hang all the records on the ceiling completely damage free.
We also used the Command Brand Picture Hanging Strips to keep the frames on the gallery wall securely in place – no need to worry if the boys bump into them running in and out of the space… they aren’t going anywhere!
If you are curious where any of the products in this space came from, I’ve link most within the text of this post, or you can hop over to the playroom source list for a complete list. At the bottom of this post, you’ll also find links to detailed tutorials for the DIY projects in this space.
But for now, just enjoy the pictures…
Because the space is so narrow {35 inches to be exact} we made the decision early on that this wouldn’t be a place to store many toys. Instead, we wanted use the wall space to engage their creativity while keeping the floor space open so they can take toys in and out as they wish, perform on their microphones, play their little instruments, or simply curl up to read {one of their favorite things to do}.
MUSIC & ART GALLERY WALL
There’s a lot going on on this wall, so let me break it down for you. The poster with the chimpanzee wearing headphones was the very first item we purchased for the wall, and he might just be my favorite part! But the musical instrument alphabet poster is also pretty cool! All the frames on this wall are part of the Ikea Ribba series.
Let’s talk about that hand guitar hanger, shall we? Beckett wanted a guitar for his second birthday, and we decided it should have a prominent place in this music-themed play space. And nothing says prominent more than a giant silver hand sticking out of the wall, right?!
We also wanted this gallery wall to be a place where the kids could display their own art work. Four frames are filled with colorful sheet music from different Beatles songs, each with a clip to hold our boys’ masterpieces.
Our boys love to make noise! What boy doesn’t right? So we installed rails with small buckets to hold lots of their little noise making devices within easy reach.
They even have a cute, red toy accordion that I hung from one of the rails.
The boys also have quite a few larger toy instruments that we store elsewhere, but now they have a perfect place to jam!
The ceiling slopes all the way down to the floor, making the back of the space a perfect reading nook for curling up with some comfy pillows and a good book! Our boys love to read, so adding some book storage was a must.
We bought the boys a small collection of new books all about music and displayed them in wall mounted magazine racks {similar to these}.
To help fill the wall space around the book racks, I added two black and white photos taken by their uncle – one of piano keys, the other guitar strings.
MAGNETIC WALL & PING PONG WALL COASTER
The sheet metal wall opposite the gallery wall serves many purposes – one of which is for use with magnetic alphabet letters and numbers, which we are storing in more plastic buckets. But the real reason we installed the sheet metal wall is this…
…pipes and plumbing pieces with magnets on the back that can be configured and reconfigured to create a ping pong ball wall coaster {also known as a ball run or a tinker track}!
Our goal was to design a play space that will grow with them for many years, and I can see 11 and 12 year old Cooper and Beckett having just as much fun with this magnetic ball run as they will now. Heck, I had a ton of fun setting it up just for these photos!
When they are done creating their mazes, all the parts and pieces can easily be stored right on the wall.
DIY SHEET MUSIC FEATURE WALL
So what does it look like when you’re at the back of the space looking toward the door? I’m glad you asked!
We installed black trim molding on both side walls, and I collaged the entire upper portion of these walls and above the door in the sheet music for Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” {which Beckett has dubbed our “family song”}.
I created a series of music lyric posters that I added on top of the sheet music using thin, colored washi tape.
The “STUDIO” marquee letters add yet another element of mood lighting in the space. The photo below also gives you a good view of the new light fixture that we installed on the wall.
I’m all about the details…so it makes me giddy that the trim molding has ridges that look so similar to the ridges in the records on the ceiling.
CEILING WALL COVERED IN VINYL RECOREDS
And speaking of the records on the sloped ceiling wall…I guess I should talk about those too! Not that you could have possibly missed them! 🙂
There are a total of 135 records on the ceiling. The ceiling was the right width for 5 records across with just about a quarter of an inch to spare. And 27 rows of records fit the ceiling from top to bottom exactly. It was like this ceiling was made for these records!
If you are interested in the details about the products used in this room, you’ll find the answers in the complete source list post, and in the following weeks for lots I’ll be posting numerous tutorials. I’ve also posted an adorable video of the boys seeing the playroom for the first time, together with some fun photos of them enjoying the space. So if you like cute kid pictures, be sure to check that out here!
Thanks for rocking out with us! If you want to catch up on the five weeks of work that led to this big reveal, you’ll find each of those posts here.
