Homeowners repurpose garages in creative ways throughout COVID pandemic
Above: Many homeowners, such as Rich Joyce, have upgraded their garages into custom areas to enjoy since the start of the COVID pandemic. (Photo: The Wall Street Journal)
Often overlooked and overcrowded, many homeowners have transformed their garages into gyms, offices, man caves, art studios, pubs and more.
Throughout the past 18 months as local restaurants, bars, gyms, and businesses have been forced to shut down, close their doors temporarily or limit seating and attendance, homeowners have found creative ways to still enjoy their favorite activities at home. As a bonus, they’ve upgraded their home’s value and maximized their total square footage.
Local bar closed? Set one up in the garage.
Don’t want to wear a mask to the gym? Bring the gym home.
Now working from home? Clean up and maximize the storage space in the garage.
One of the biggest trends in the past two years has been the billions of dollars that U.S. homeowners have poured into their homes. Relegated to spending much more time at home during the pandemic, homeowners have done any number of improvements from simply painting rooms or adding gardens to remodeling kitchens and back patios – all in an effort to enjoy their space a little more. But the need to maximize their square footage in order to live, work or play at home has also led many to taking a space that often gets overlooked and overcrowded, the garage, and transforming it into a useful area to be enjoyed. Of course at Custom Garage Solutions, we are all about transforming homes one garage at a time.
The Wall Street Journal recently detailed this trend with their article “These Home Garages Sat Idle Before Covid. Now They’re Gyms, Art Studios and Even Pubs.”
The article profiles several homeowners including Tom West and his wife Ann, who have owned their home for 25 years. Tom enjoys painting and recently spent his free time painting in the basement of his Maryland home, next to the furnace and the washer and dryer. For almost as long, he dreamed of turning his property’s detached two-car garage, seldom used for parking, into an art studio. The pandemic accelerated his desire to revamp his garage into an art studio, complete with large windows for natural light. “Since I started painting in natural light, I realized how deprived I was in my old space,” West said. “I was starting to see colors I had not realized were as brilliant as they were.”
Rich and Jennifer Joyce of Massachusetts turned their home garage into a bar area complete with a 4-foot wooden bar and pinball machine where friends and neighbors gather every Friday night. We love hearing of these stories and we love hearing the ideas from all of our customers about how they can truly turn the garage from an uninspired “catch-all” area of the home into an area filled with purpose, and perhaps many future memories.
If you are curious about upgrading the garage space in your Colorado home, you can learn more about our Custom Garage Solutions Floor Systems, cabinets and shelving or other custom upgrades that we can provide. You can also request a free estimate here. We’d love to work with you anywhere in the Denver area!
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