Basement renos necessitate moving aquariums

On occasion, a renovation project presents an interesting twist on an existing concept. During a recent basement gut and remodel, the main rec room would include a feature wall unlike anything I’ve created in the past. Although several Reno Boss columns have highlighted feature walls that included a wall-mount fireplace and/or a flatscreen TV, surrounded by decorative stone or tile, this lower-level wall is sure to turn heads.

My fondness for animals knows no bounds. And anyone who truly knows me expects my attention during the first few minutes of most workdays to be directed toward my clients’ family pet(s). Those brief yet meaningful moments, bonding with newfound fur friends, are soothing and often create some of my favourite memories of a jobsite, beyond the satisfaction of the project’s successful conclusion.

The planning for this basement renovation included some standard upgrades: a better wall configuration to create efficient use of space for each room; bathroom and laundry room overhauls; and expanding upon the usable space in the rec room by creating wall insets for both the fridge and upright freezer.

But there was one lingering issue that created a few hurdles — where to place the two, 48-by-18-inch aquariums? Until this reno, these (and a few smaller aquariums) had been bunched together, hidden away within a gloomy laundry room. It was understood that once the laundry room was upgraded, the aquariums could no longer be conveniently housed there.

Smart planting

A garden may look effortlessly beautiful, but as with other facets of life, beauty is often shaped and cultivated.

No matter the size of the space you manage — whether it’s a large landscape or a postage-size patch — effort and strategy are required to achieve and protect the garden you create.

Wild swings in temperature, strong winds, heavy rainfall or long dry spells can disrupt the best laid plans. Whatever the weather, keep your garden looking beautiful by choosing reliable plants for areas that are at the mercy of the elements.

Practical methods that are employed early in the season will fortify your garden against water loss, improve drainage and help to maintain your garden’s beauty.

From drab to fab

An untidy, dingy or even dirty laundry area is an oxymoron — an insult to cleanliness.

An uninviting laundry room can also lead to procrastination when chores demand action. During a recent gutting and remodelling of a basement, there were subsidiary projects that needed to be tackled, and the laundry space would prove to be the most dramatic transformation.

It’s quite likely that many homeowners have endured a less-than-favourable laundry space. Typically, home renovations start elsewhere, with the kitchen, bathrooms, flooring and painting usually taking precedent. The laundry room is often tucked away in a corner of the basement behind a closed door. It took years, even decades, before my own laundry room was upgraded, and boy, what a difference it has made in our day-to-day rituals. My wife said it best: “I used to hate doing laundry until the reno, and now I look forward to being down there.”

The basement renovation for my clients involved repositioning most inner walls to enhance the layout of the existing rooms. Although the laundry room square footage would diminished slightly as a result, the functionality would be greatly improved with the introduction of upper and lower cupboards for storage. A secondary “faux” wall would create a flat vertical surface upon which the cabinets could be mounted.

Not all basement doors are open-and-shut cases

When it comes to basement overhauls, previous experience has prepared me for potential hurdles.

The usual suspects include uneven concrete floors, shabby ceilings and questionable window seals. And although I’m always prepared for the unexpected, a recent renovation threw a few extra curveballs my way.

Fortunately, I’m always ready to swing.

Once the basement had been re-framed, including introducing new walls to create a better flow in the space, subfloor panels were installed throughout to level the existing concrete floors, as well as to insulate between the planned vinyl plank and the cold basement shell. I had anticipated the extra height required to compensate for the rise in subfloor elevation when framing the doorways, but the existing ceiling joists (taking into account the gap needed to hang suspended tiles) no longer allowed for a traditional rough framing height of 81.5 inches for a standard 80-inch pre-hung interior door.

Even ‘deer-resistant’ plants can tempt hungry critters

What does “deer-resistant” really mean?

With a growing deer population in Fort Richmond, resident Mary Ann Shaw is becoming increasingly aware that there is a distinct gap between assurances that a plant is deer-resistant and reality.

If there is one thing deer will tell you, deer-resistant does not mean deer-proof.

Shaw’s property is across the street from the 37.4-hectare Kings Park.

Drywall or tiles with style? When it comes to replacing ceilings, you’ve got options

Roughly a decade ago, a homeowner was adamant he wanted his basement ceiling drywalled, to match the style of the main floor of the house.

Although it was an older home, the basement had high enough floor joists above to allow for seven-and-a-half foot ceilings, completely drywalled. The project went fine, but several locations required quick access panels to reach service shut-offs and clean-outs. And therein lies the rub — why drywall a basement ceiling if a bunch of holes are required?

Don’t get me wrong, I completely understand why a client might insist upon a drywalled ceiling in the basement — it makes the lower level feel much like the rest of the house. However, most scenarios would not allow a clean installation of drywall, primarily because of the services that run throughout the lower-level ceiling joists: main ducts for the HVAC system, hot and cold water feeds, drain plumbing that connects to a main stack, and so on.

There are generally accepted alternatives in these cases, and they can be quite complementary when installed strategically.

It’s bloomin’ plant sale season

It’s been a cool and windy start to spring this year. The anticipation of flowers — not a few pretty blooms scattered here and there but a lush and abundant flowering display — grows stronger each day.

Even small spaces can be filled with masses of vibrant flowers. For lasting appeal, choose quintessential perennials such as irises, peonies, clematis, delphinium, poppies, salvia, foxglove, clustered bellflower, daisies, speedwell, salvia, lady’s mantle, phlox, echinops (globe thistle), daylilies, snow-in-summer and more. You can also sprinkle in self-seeding annuals like snapdragons, cornflowers and calendula.

What could be more satisfying than a classic cottage garden look that features extravagant colour? Key factors include planting densely in groups of at least three. Choose plants of different heights, including ground covers, so that no bare ground is visible. You may also want to create curved borders and add a vertical structure such as an obelisk, trellis or arbour.

But above all, you will need beautiful plants that flower reliably.

The canola oil experiment, revisited

In late June of 2023, my Reno Boss column depicted an experiment using canola oil to treat my aging deck boards, and the column generated the most feedback I have ever received for any of mine to date.

Interest in the ongoing performance of the canola oil on my deck still finds my inbox with queries, on occasion. After receiving a couple of them recently, I thought it might be a good idea to revisit the experiment and discuss the results it has yielded.

The concept of using canola oil arose after having treated my front and rear decks once they began to fade. Both had been subjected to years of sunlight, and the resilience of the brown treated lumber had clearly dissipated.

My first attempt at rejuvenation involved an expensive Behr deep-penetrating oil product. The process involved clearing the entire deck surface, prepping the top decking by using a high-pressure spray wand, letting it dry and choosing an arid morning to quickly apply the expensive oil in such a manner that sequential lines of application would not reveal any overlaps.

Beguiling begonias

All it took was one look at Rodney Wohlgemuth’s begonias and I decided to break my own rule of not buying begonias before May 15.

Wohlgemuth owns Green Oak Gardens, located two kilometres east of Beausejour. The expansive greenhouses are tucked behind a large red barn in a picturesque rural setting with a winding creek and a sweep of mature trees in the background.

On my visit on May 1, the sun’s rays were warm and there wasn’t a hint of wind. I was primed to shop for plants.

Wohlgemuth grows a wide variety including annuals, perennials, shrubs and trees. He especially loves begonias which are displayed throughout the main greenhouse — luscious begonias on plant tables as soon as you step inside the greenhouse, begonias in hanging baskets above you and begonias in beautiful mixed containers on the floor.

Book a passionate, grassroots call to protect and grow our urban forests

Out on a Limb by Erna Buffie is a 100-plus page, digest-sized paperback packed with a powerful message about the importance of preserving and growing Winnipeg’s urban forest.

It’s one of those rare books where not a single word is wasted. This is not a sentimental ode to trees but rather a passionate call to immediate action.

Published this year by Great Plains Press, Buffie’s work is the third instalment in the City Project series. The series’ editors are Emma and Michel Durand-Wood. Together with Buffie, all three are grassroots activists who do not shirk from citizen-led action to preserve Winnipeg’s tree canopy.

As a documentary filmmaker, Buffie worked with CBC’s acclaimed series, The Nature of Things, for more than 20 years. She directed Smarty Plants, an award-winning 2012 documentary which uncovers the real secret world of plants. She also directed episodes of the incomparable Canadian documentary series, Recreating Eden, which ran for five seasons on CBC.

Seize the opportunity

The introduction of an additional laundry room on the second floor within any home is a tricky prospect at the best of times and requires careful planning prior to execution.

Although a laundry room was not a priority during an elaborate kitchen remodel I handled, an opportunity presented itself to tackle the endeavour.

While the walls were being stripped down to studs on the main floor, a useful corridor via which to run rough plumbing and electrical from the basement to the second level was too good for the homeowners to pass up.

This particular kitchen remodel a couple years ago was a huge project. The area of the dining room into the old kitchen was roughly 700 square feet in size, and involved removing a dividing wall, introducing two new kitchen picture windows and a side coffee bar with sink beyond the centre island with the main sink area.

Elevate a home’s lower-level flooring

Basements in newer house construction often follow a similar process to that found on any other floor of a home — joists with plywood or OSB sheathing atop as a subfloor.

This configuration is possible when a new house is being built with a crawlspace below the lower-level floor structure. Not only does this help in keeping the basement warmer, it also allows easier access to run rough plumbing and electrical below the basement floor elevation.

However, in older homes, the basement floor is generally concrete, which can be quite limiting. As one can imagine, changes to the existing rough plumbing of a basement level in an older dwelling with a concrete floor will be very costly. As such, basement bathroom renovations in such dwellings often utilize the existing placement of the toilet flange, sink and shower drains to avoid increasing costs.

At a current basement renovation project, the homeowners elected to recycle the existing bathroom layout for that very reason. However, costs were then incurred by adding a sump pit and pump and also a backwater valve as preventative measures against the possibility of a storm sewer surge that could inundate the basement.

Get it in writing from contractors this summer

Now that winter weather appears to be behind us, Manitobans are turning their attention to preparing for spring yard work, gardening and planning on how best to enjoy the long and beautiful summer we all deserve.

Sometimes, that also means planning a summer renovation project for your home. Many homeowners are booking these summer projects with renovators now. But one thing to keep in mind when researching both your residential project and picking the right renovator to do it, is that when a deal sounds too good to be true, it usually is.

There are some key points to remember when you are offered a “really great deal” on home renovations, especially cash-only deals where the person doing the work is being paid “under the table.” These deals usually mean no taxes are paid and no permits are taken out for the work to be done. Possessing no receipt and no contract also means there is no record of the work being done on a dwelling.

If your contractor cuts a few corners and uses substandard materials, you have no recourse because there was no formal agreement. If the workmanship is shoddy or the renovation work caused some damage to your home, there is no actual record of the work ever taking place.

Magnificent maples: All you need to know to grow species of our iconic national tree

Maples are one of the most common tree requests at garden centres every spring.

Mastering the drywall ‘frame’ game

When the term “framing” is used in the context of interior construction, the first connotation is that of structural support and layout.

However, framing for just about any project can lead to frustration if the process is not well-planned from the get-go. While minor shifts and changes are often necessary to facilitate implementation of subsequent tasks, insufficient planning that overlooks all the requirements of a project can result in the need for drastic measures later on.

Interior framing can be quite monotonous, despite its necessity. In addition to helping sidestep small glitches, incorporating a strategic approach serves a very important purpose. As an example, framing the back wall of a basement bathroom to accommodate a vanity may seem straightforward enough — studs positioned atop a base at 16-inches on centre with a cap plate, then secured to the adjacent walls and ceiling joists above.

However, by first verifying the intended location of the ABS rough plumbing, the studs can be shifted slightly to better accommodate the process, rather than having to chop through a newly erected stud that may be inconveniently located for the plumbing feed.