Basement Project #11: Finishing Touches on Cabinetry & Flooring

Cabinetry and the Oil vs. Latex Paint Debate

One of my incentives for remodeling the basement was to create storage for those infrequently used items—such as kitchen appliances (mixer, corn popper), items bought in bulk, vases, light bulbs, wine, wrapping paper and ribbon—and enclosing them in a cabinet so they wouldn’t gather layers of dust that has to be removed before you can use any of them. My new space has pantry storage shelves, a base cabinet with drawers, wine cellar, and a closet to hold items we will take to and from the cabin such as golf clubs, coolers, paper products, etc. For the first time ever my basement is organized and I know where to find things.


I chose to do all the trim and cabinets in white to keep the basement as light as possible and because I don’t plan to ever change the color. It’s easy to repaint a wall but not cabinets and trim.

In the past I would have used oil-based paints to enamel the cabinets but I have become a believer in latex paints. Not only are they much more durable than in the past but they are a healthier choice and better for the environment. Using latex also saves a lot of time. It dries so quickly that you can paint an hour after applying the primer and only a few hours later for the second coat.



I’m thrilled with the cabinets but I did have to spend many hours priming and painting them. In addition to the cabinets there are six doors—to the cat litter room, closet, laundry, bathroom, plant room and mechanical room—that needed to be painted. I am grateful to my friend Dianne who graciously lent a hand when she realized I was completely overwhelmed with the amount of painting that needed to be done.

Of course I would have preferred to paint a
floor like this tile floor in Vietnam!

Concrete Floor & The Stain vs. Paint Debate

Once the cabinets and trim were painted I turned my attention to staining my newly poured “virgin” concrete floor. To warm up the room I wanted a “marbleized“ look of brown tones or possibly a mixture of rust, green and brown.

I soon found out that even though it was new concrete, I would need to etch the floor with an acid product so it would properly accept the stain. I used acid on concrete many years ago without proper ventilation and nearly killed myself with the fumes. I didn’t want to do that again so once again I turned to Natural Built Home for a healthier and more eco-friendly solution. I bought a latex etching product and three colors of latex stains. I watched the U-Tube video on staining floors and it looked so easy—yeah right, just like the ceiling install had looked easy! I choose an obscure area of the floor to experiment with the samples. No matter what I did the results weren’t good.


Luckily Dan Wolf, a paint and wallpaper professional, happened to be here. He told me I was crazy not to just paint the floor. So I bought three colors of Porch and Deck paint from Benjamin Moore. After experimenting for hours on pieces of drywall and on the floor of the workout area, I decided that I didn’t have the skill, practice or training to end up with the blended effect I hoped to achieve.

Instead, I painted the entire floor in Midnight Sky—the same deep blue color I used to set off the Moroccan pattern on the Murphy bed panel—and I’m very happy with it.

Floor Finishing Tip: Even though Porch and Deck paint is supposed to be tough, I recommend finishing the floor with a final protective coat of polyurethane.

Finally I can put the jute rugs down that I bought from IKEA and the rubber mats I purchased for the workout area.

The flat-screened TV is hung and the treadmill is in place. I’m hoping to have time soon to take advantage of both of them. 

There are only a few things to be done: Finish the plant room/ dog washing room, tile the walls of the laundry room, help my husband finish his wine room and do some interior decorating of the room.

Almost there…

Basement Project #6: Concrete Solutions

Most homeowners know, or will soon find out, that the least sexy repairs cost the most money. A new roof, new furnace, new wiring—or in my case, new basement walls and floor—inevitably eat up a giant share of the budget. However, these things are the basis of solid, enduring construction and good design.

Pouring a new cement floor and redashing the walls with concrete was by far the greatest expense items in my basement project—almost half of the total cost. But both were necessary. The walls were in a constant state of deterioration, continually sloughing cement sand and dust onto the floor and onto anything placed next to them. The floor sagged and heaved as though moles had been at work below the cement; numerous cracks were everywhere. When the sewer backed up earlier in the year we discovered that everything flowed to the middle of the rec room toward a floor drain that had been capped. All these conditions were reason enough to pour a new cement floor.

Floor is gone, new footing poured

I got a couple of bids from cement contractors, considered several other factors, such as reputation and workmanship, and decided to hire Jerry Gardner, Gardner Construction, Inc. I visited the home of one of their satisfied clients and was impressed with what Gardner had done to their basement walls. After hearing a glowing recommendation I decided they were the ones.

As a little aside here, it isn’t always cheapest contractor who is the best choice. Some contractors are just more skilled or experienced than others. It’s also important to get comparable bids. Sometimes a project changes or grows after consulting with the first contractor, so the second one might actually be bidding to do more work. If you have a written plan that all contractors refer to when making a bid you are more likely to get bids that compare “apples to apples”. 

Putting wire mesh on walls in exercise area

The concrete work in my basement was a huge job but they were very efficient—in and out in just a few days. They had about 7 guys working at once so things happened quickly.

Newly redashed wall, drying

Another redashed wall

The first day they took up the old cement floor, hauled it away, and began putting wire mesh on all the walls. The next day they were back early to finish putting on the mesh and to spread the first coat of cement over all the walls. The third day a second coat of cement was applied. Voila! The walls were done. 

Walls alone might have taken the average DIY homeowner several months to complete. 

Yes!  New floor drain next to new water heater

Before they could pour a new floor I had a plumber come out to remove the old floor drain which had been previously capped off. He added a new floor drain and new water heater in the mechanical room. He also ran a sewer pipe for a new powder room which is planned for the first floor (more about that soon).

Pouring new floor

Leveling the new concrete floor

The concrete crew came back, the walls were marked with a laser and the sand leveled so the new cement floor could be poured. The floor was poured in just one day and then they were gone.

Old floor gone, moisture barrier down

Deciding how to finish the new cement floor came next. Home Depot carries a product called DriCore which acts as an insulator and barrier between any moisture in the cement floor and the finished floor. It allows carpet or engineered floors of wood and linoleum to be installed in a basement without having to worrying about mold and mildew. I am a big fan of cork, so my first choice was to float a cork floor. However, the 3/4” of DriCore plus the 3/4” of cork would raise the level of the floor by 11/2". Given that my ceilings are only 88" tall unfinished, cork was not a practical choice. It also would have made the final step down to the basement only 6” while the other steps have a 71/2" rise. If you’ve ever stepped on irregular steps you know how annoying and almost dangerous it can be.

An advantage to my newly poured concrete floor was I didn’t really have to cover it with anything. So I decided to save money by simply staining the new concrete and putting down jute rugs from IKEA. An 8 x 10’ rug costs about $130 so if it should get wet it would not be a big loss.

Okay, solid walls and a new floor may not be sexy but nonetheless they are very exciting to me.

My friend Mark has offered to trade carpentry work for design work so now he can now come over and we can discuss the plans for walls, ceiling, insulation etc.  More about those developments soon…