Re-thinking your space - the multipurpose room

Over the last few years the trend for baby boomers has been to stay in their home rather than to sell, move and adjust to a new community.   In the case of the empty nester that often means making the back bedroom into a multipurpose room that they can enjoy all year round and still have available for  guest or when the kids come back to visit. While other homeowners may decide they need just a little more space so they add on an additional room to serve a specific purpose. Our latest project gave us an opportunity to work with a husband and wife who are having fun making their  new room addition work for their current lifestyle.
                     

A project like this is exciting.  It's fun to work with people and it's fun to listen to their plans for their home.  The needs of the homeowner is what drives any project.  That usually means there are several meetings before any construction can begin.  The homeowner has to decide on the wood species and  finish they prefer and exactly what they want this piece of furniture to do for them.  Do they want drawers, do they need lights?.  Because of the size of this wall unit (190"w by 109" high), the first part of the project was to build the custom furniture and install it. 

This is a queen size Murphy bed flanked by drawers and cabinets on both sides. The bed sits back so that we have some room for a shelf which is also used as a support for the bed when it is down.  There is a budget decision for the homeowner when it comes to the pull down mechanism.  You can have a manual pull down which is not very difficult or a remote control mechanism that does the job. 

As you can see there are lights in the top that will showcase pottery and books when the room is completed.  There are also lights at the top within the bed area so that people can read in bed if they want.  The base cabinets are 24"deep cabinets with full extension undermount glides for the drawers.  The wood species is alder with a fruitwood stain and a warm glaze.

With that wall in place it is now time to focus on the other side of the room.