Help me decorate--basement colors and carpet

[Harriet Vane]

Edited to add: Now we're thinking more seriously of hard flooring. Dh is allergic to dust and a friend of mine says we should really do hard flooring. Any thoughts? Thanks.

 

I struggle with decorating. Often my first pass at a room is all wrong and I end up re-doing and tweaking to death. I need help. 

We are sprucing up our basement. There are three rooms--an office and a playroom, and a utility room. The utility room is getting a generic white paint facelift, so no questions there.

Currently the office and playroom are painted gray with oatmeal-colored (cream/beige) carpeting. This is how it was when we bought the house. It has always irritated me that they mixed cool grey with warm beige. 

I have been assuming I would go with gray berber-style carpet and gray walls so that what I hang on the walls will stand out. This is still a valid option. 

However, I have been despairing because the rooms are soooooo bland. Other rooms of my house are painted varying shades of blue with strong gray undertones, and the dining room is painted dark green. The living room is dark because the windows are all shaded by porches, so we painted that room white (absolutely the right choice there), but it has bold nature paintings in shades of green and blue.

The playroom will be set up for small children for now even though we don't have any--we are thinking about picking up with foster care again but have not made a final decision on that. If we move away from small kids in our life, then we would put the play kitchen and playhouse facade in the utility room and set up the playroom for exercising. 

The office is a combination. One third is where dh works from home--it will have bookcases and a standing desk and filing cabinets. The other half is for our shared desk with PC and for my crafting (sewing, scrapbooking). Our furniture for that room is best described as "garage sale chic."😂 We may upgrade at some point if we get around to it.

I am not a great housekeeper and so I lean towards easy and low-maintenance. That's why I am considering berber carpet?

The basement is soooooo dark. Only one tiny glass-block window in the office and another one in the utility room. We have can lights throughout the ceiling which help.

SO, color and carpet recommendations? My ideas so far are gray walls and gray carpet OR perhaps blue variegated berber with either gray or white walls. I kinda wonder if I should be brave with a color on the walls but the stuff we have to hang is fairly eclectic with lots of colors, so there's not an obvious unifying theme. If the rooms had more windows I could see painting the walls navy, but I worry that would shrink our dark basement into a creepy little cave.

We have some funny sections of the ceiling that are lower to cover pipes/ducts/whatever, and dh has enthusiastically suggested painting those sections some other contrasting color. I am a little worried about that option but what do I know. 

I hope someone with more decorating panache will wade in and offer some reassurance and guidance. Thanks!

 

Edited December 29, 2021 by Harriet Vane

[Dianthus]

Are there windows? I would be concerned with making a dark basement cave like and would tend to want warmer and brighter.

[Frances]

Personally, I love the combination of grey, coral, and navy. We recently painted the walls in the unfinished portion of our basement grey except for one coral one. I love the pop of color. We did an epoxy finish on the concrete floor that has lots of blue flakes of various shades and we have a dark navy leather sofa in the family room area.

[happi duck]

For some reason gray and turquoise sprang to mind.  I'm thinking a carpet that picks up both colors throughout and then gray walls in the office and turquoise walls in the playroom.

[MercyA]

We have bright yellow and light yellow walls in our basement. I especially love the light yellow; calming and cheery at the same time. 

We paired the yellow walls with a light brown vinyl floor. It looks very nice and is low-maintenance. We've had a few bad leaks in the basement and I was so thankful not to have carpet down there. It has nice padding and is comfortable to walk on. We do have a rug in the kids' play area.

[Carrie12345]

I am NO expert in color.
That said, I’ve become a fan of yellows and or teals in primarily light gray spaces.  Or that’s just what the internet is feeding me while I attempt to learn how to design and decorate by May???

I am and assume I always will be obsessed with a gray/white/black palate. I’ve decided to go with reds as my accent, since dh and the kids are always bringing in firefighting related stuff anyway. Might as well tie it in!  But that might be too much with your particular wall decor unless it’s got some reds in there. And it probably plays different with blacks and dark grays vs. light.

On a pale background, I’m really thinking yellow.
And I’m a fan of Berber.

[Clemsondana]

Our living room has light blue walls, gray (solid and a tweed-like pattern) furniture, and then pillows and throws that are mostly in the coral family.  One of the pillows is floral and has some spring or celery green in it.  The coral really does brighten up the room, so maybe going with an accent color like that?  If you kept gray walls you could sort of reverse what we have, using blues or ight greens along with coral?  The navy suggested above would also look good and you'd have lots of choices for an accent color depending on your furniture and art.

In our bedroom, we also have a chair covered in a lighter gray (it gets less traffic, and no grungy kid use!).  In this room, we have bottle-glass green walls and alternate using a white coverlet in summer and a dark purple heavy bedspread in winter, so that's another color combo that would work with gray (you could go with a lighter purple instead - I have a print on the wall that has the green along with a couple of shades of purple and we often use lavender sheets and I like how it looks).  

Do you specifically want carpet?  When we redid our bathroom we used one of those wood-look tiles and I know that they make laminate or even...is it a high-end vinyl that is similar to the old linoleom that they keep using on those home-remodel shows?  Anyway, our house is mostly wood but in our bathroom we did tile that looks like weathered gray wood.  It has a lot of white in it and it is the best thing I've seen for not showing dirt.  If we ever pull the carpet out of the upstairs playroom I debate whether i'd go with a wood look that matches the rest of the house or whether I'd use this because I really like how it looks.  

[lmrich]

Sherwin Williams offers free color consultations. 

How much light does the room get? Basements can be tricky. 

Are you married to the idea of carpet? Do you have any furniture for the playroom? 

 

[Harriet Vane]

4 minutes ago, lmrich said:

Sherwin Williams offers free color consultations. 

How much light does the room get? Basements can be tricky. 

Are you married to the idea of carpet? Do you have any furniture for the playroom? 

 

Almost no natural light. There is just a tiny glass block rectangle in the office and another one over in the utility room.

I have hardwood throughout the rest of the house. I was assuming carpet for the basement to be warmer and softer (especially for dh who stands at his desk most of the time), and because I feared tile or laminate would look bare or like a gym or something. I thought in that case I might end up throwing down an area rug or two, in which case just have carpet? But that said, dust can be an issue too. Totally open to suggestions here.

[fairfarmhand]

Light Yellow walls will add excitement and cheer to a gloomy space. White trim. I’d do wood look tile in a heartbeat. You can get a lighter tone, a grayish or a beige and that would “warm” it without making it look industrial and cold. 
 

ive found very little decor that I couldn’t make work with my light yellow walls.

[Hilltopmom]

We have bright yellow walls in our basement playroom. (Painted over old dark brown paneling) We just finished ripping out the red shag carpeting that’s been down there since the 70s… so as long as you don’t have that, I’d say you’re good 😂 

we put up large LED overhead lighting and that had helped a lot too w it h brightening it up- still no natural sunlight but the kids aren’t afraid to play down there anymore! (Plus we put a TV down there for a Xmas present and they’re psyched)

[BlsdMama]

We did a warm beige. Basements are a colder space so I didn’t want to do gray. We allowed the kids to do gray in their bedrooms but they have windows and bedspreads, curtains, pillows, etc to make the space comfy. White trim brightens it and we put in a LOT of can lighting and installed the ceiling as high as possible with a drop ceiling. 
 

We began finishing the basement 7+ years ago and we are STILL not in agreement with the flooring. I despise carpet and feel we are begging for mold. Even if it is utterly water tight and has great ventilation/air circulation, you eventually have to clean them. Just no. I stained two of the bedroom floors myself before I got sick. I attached before and after pictures.  I adore those rooms. I wish I’d done every room. Stained concrete with area rugs. It’s perfect imo. That said, DH is willing to compromise with a vinyl plank LVT and I think that would work. Carpet in the basement is my hill to die on. 

Edited December 30, 2021 by BlsdMama
Attach pics

[Frances]

13 hours ago, Harriet Vane said:

Almost no natural light. There is just a tiny glass block rectangle in the office and another one over in the utility room.

I have hardwood throughout the rest of the house. I was assuming carpet for the basement to be warmer and softer (especially for dh who stands at his desk most of the time), and because I feared tile or laminate would look bare or like a gym or something. I thought in that case I might end up throwing down an area rug or two, in which case just have carpet? But that said, dust can be an issue too. Totally open to suggestions here.

Do you  ever have water issues in your basement? While we have both indoor and outdoor sump pumps, there is still the potential for water issues. So the only place we have carpet is in the media room and then it is just laid down, not attached in any way. So if we needed to, we could just remove the entire piece and take outside to dry.

[Hilltopmom]

9 hours ago, Frances said:

Do you  ever have water issues in your basement? While we have both indoor and outdoor sump pumps, there is still the potential for water issues. So the only place we have carpet is in the media room and then it is just laid down, not attached in any way. So if we needed to, we could just remove the entire piece and take outside to dry.

That’s what we do- a large floor carpet over tiles. When wet in spring we can roll it up and put it up on chairs off the floor. Everything is up on wheels or posts to move it or be above water.

[livetoread]

We are redoing our basement after a sewage back up, and at first I was set on just replacing the carpet. After exploring what I wanted (berber or low pile) and pricing it, I decided to go with lvp. Cheaper and we can do it ourselves which saves even more. I expect it to last longer, too.

[PeterPan]

On 12/29/2021 at 8:34 AM, Harriet Vane said:

Almost no natural light.

You might hit Home Depot/Lowes and look at adding some light. Last I was in there I saw some really snazzy LED/florescent style long rectangular things that would be very attractive in a basement to brighten that right up.

Yes a greige or grey can be nice. Just don't go strong. Some people embrace the low ceiling and paint it dark, if you can imagine. You might try searching google image or Houzz type places to get pictures. Then get *samples* and paint them on white poster board that you can hold up on various walls and various times of day. There are colors I've thought would be good in my basement that were really garish. The light definitely matters.

LED bulbs now come in two shades: a daylight and something else. Basically more blue/alert or more warm/calm. My dh LOVES that right blue, cool kelvin kind of light in work areas, and I like the warmer shades. So the kelvin of the new fixtures would drive the function and feel of the space.

Yes on hard flooring. Was the carpet glued down? I know little about carpet. My basement is all hard flooring with area rugs. Great for cleaning, terrible for feel/coziness. If you want it to feel cozy, you might want to do carpet. I like thick rug pads under my rugs to bring back in the comfort, but that would be almost as $$ as carpeting the room.

https://tixeertne.wordpress.com/2015/03/02/basement-reveal/  Ok, this is super cute. I was just googling to see ideas.

[Carrie12345]

On 12/29/2021 at 8:34 AM, Harriet Vane said:

Almost no natural light. There is just a tiny glass block rectangle in the office and another one over in the utility room.

I have hardwood throughout the rest of the house. I was assuming carpet for the basement to be warmer and softer (especially for dh who stands at his desk most of the time), and because I feared tile or laminate would look bare or like a gym or something. I thought in that case I might end up throwing down an area rug or two, in which case just have carpet? But that said, dust can be an issue too. Totally open to suggestions here.

Oh, if you’re open to ditching carpet, I always vote LVP. Not gym-like at all (imo.) And I find caring for rugs SO much easier than caring for carpet.

[Harriet Vane]

10 hours ago, Carrie12345 said:

Oh, if you’re open to ditching carpet, I always vote LVP. Not gym-like at all (imo.) And I find caring for rugs SO much easier than caring for carpet.

So dh actually prefers hard flooring with area rugs. He was going along with carpet because he thought that’s what I want. So now I think almost definitely hard flooring.

I am contemplating white walls more and more as a way to brighten the space. I think the key will be making sure we hang decorations right away rather than last-eventually. I’ve always treated my office space as an afterthought, so it has always been ugly and cluttered, with the very worst of furniture odds and ends. I often grab my work to go sit somewhere more pleasant, like the dining room. Now at nearly fifty I have finally accepted that I work from home and would appreciate more charm in my office, especially since dh works from home quite a bit as well.