Stone Ridge is a basement in Scarborough, in the east of Toronto. We finished it from front to back: a rec room with a media wall, an arched wet bar, a full bathroom, a laundry room and a bedroom. Ceara at Juliette Interiors designed it and our crew built it. We don't have a video from this job, so everything below comes from the finished rooms and what you can see in the photos.
What we built
The basement was a set of closed-off spaces, and we opened it into one floor. It now holds a rec room for the TV, a wet bar with a curved kitchenette, a full bathroom, a laundry room and a bedroom reached through a walk-in closet with pocket doors. Every room has something built in. The same brass, white oak and cream finishes run through all of them, so the basement looks like the rest of the house rather than an add-on.
The design problem
Basements are low, and their small windows sit high in the wall. A big open room down there can feel like a basement however it's finished. Here the design puts the character into the walls: panelling, an arch and built-ins, rather than furniture.
The media wall is the anchor of the rec room. Vertical panelling runs floor to ceiling behind the TV, with white oak floating shelves and brass sconces on each side and a long low cabinet under a stone top. It gives the room a focal point, with a small window set high in the corner beside it.
The wet bar sits in its own arch. The inside of the arch is panelled and painted a dark brown, so the bar reads as a built-in nook rather than a run of cabinets against a wall. It has a sink, a built-in microwave, cream lower cabinets and one shelf under two round brass-rimmed lights.
The bathroom
The bathroom is the most detailed room on the floor. It has a white oak shaker vanity, an arched black mirror and a frameless glass walk-in shower in handmade-look tile. The shower niche and bench are faced in a white stone with heavy dark red and black veining, and the floor is a black and white octagon-and-dot tile. Black clamps and a black handle on the shower glass pick up the mirror frame, and brass taps and sconces tie it back to the bar and the rec room.
The laundry and the bedroom
The laundry room is built to be worked in. It has a deep sink with a brass faucet, a pull-out folding shelf, closed storage and a rail under the window for hanging clothes. The bedroom has a white oak nightstand under a frosted window, with a wall-mounted light above it.
What this job proves
Stone Ridge shows the kind of basement we build: every room planned, built-ins doing the work that furniture would otherwise have to, and one set of finishes carried through the whole floor so it feels like part of the house. If you're planning a basement in Toronto or Durham Region, Ontario, the basement renovations page explains how we take one on.
Watch it
James and Ceara walk through the finished basement in the Stone Ridge tour, from the open rec room to the curbless shower in the ensuite. The styled walkthrough is a short, music-only look at the details.
