How to Turn a Spare Room into a Full-Blown Man Cave

Hello World!  Welcome Friends!  Elvis famously had Graceland… Thoreau had his Walden Pond… Heck… Batman still has his good-old, trusty 600-million-dollar Bat Cave…

The bottom line – most men want to have a place where they could work on their passion projects, have fun with their closest friends and at the end of the day, completely relax…

As comedian and the host of home-improvement podcast Ace On the House says, most of us would love to live like Lorenzo Lamas in Renegade, however if you have a wife and kids… You simply can’t do that…

And that’s why most guys have their trusty man-caves… it’s basically a necessity in today’s day and age. You don’t believe me? Well we even have scientific data to back our claims up…

Photo by Gina Zee on Unsplash

Getting Started…

According to a study published in the Journal of Family Psychology, cortisol levels in men drop significantly when they have more “alone time” in their own homes. Basically, when it comes to relaxation, men simply benefit more from withdrawing than women do.

So the next time your girlfriend/wife gives you a hard time about spending all day in front of the TV watching football, you can just quote the study above and for once, win the argument.

The question now is – how can you create a perfect man cave on a budget – because chances are, you don’t have $20k to invest in a full-blown entertainment system… After all, you’re aware of the fact that not all man caves are created equal…

In order to help you create a personal space where you’ll spend at least 52 days every year, here are things you need to do to transform that empty room in your house into a full-blown man cave…

Preparing the Room 

• Insulation

Since you’ll be spending every Sunday watching sports in your room, you need to have insulated. But be warned, this is a time-consuming task, because you’ll have to insulate everything from the ceiling to the door. According to Improvement.com’s insulation cost estimator, the average homeowner in the US pays around $1,300 for insulation. But this is the average price for all insulation projects around the house, so insulating one room will probably cost a lot less…

• Painting

You don’t want your favorite room in the house to look dull, so you need to put in some work into coloring and designing. And everything starts with a fresh coat of paint on the walls. This will also, require a ton of work, so it may be wise to consult a professional if you don’t want to lose a couple of days painting the room. And when it comes to the color choice, Benjamin Moore’s Smoldering Red and Olympic Paint’s Cosmic Dust are among the more popular ones, but it’s all up to you…

• Flooring

The flooring is also one of the most important elements here, especially if you’re trying to turn your garage into a man cave. The standard garage floor is usually cold and unwelcoming – these are two feelings no man wants for his special room. You can always add floorboards, but this can be expensive and risky. The cheaper idea is to buy large area rugs, or if you have a little more money to spend, go for the more comfortable flooring option…

Adding Personal Touches

Even if you’re working with a limited space, there are still plenty of items that can make watching your favorite games or the Super Bowl more exciting and enjoyable. Your budget might be small at this point, but just a couple cool accessories can turn a small personal space into a real man cave and even make some of your friends totally envious…

• Mini Home Theater

For starters, you have to realize that you don’t need a projector and a huge surround sound system to build a small home theater all by yourself. There are, in fact, more cost-effective options. For example, instead of a giant 70” screen, you can get 55” Series 7 ULED TV that received rave reviews online, and won’t completely empty out your wallet.

• Home Bar Stools

You can’t watch a game without a couple of drinks, right? In addition to drinks, you also need somewhere to sit and take a small beer break during halftime, so why not do it in style… You can get this Costar Home Furnishings three-piece retro set that consists of a small bar table and two stools. It costs only $150.00 and will be a great addition to your room…

• Shot Glass Display

Everyone loves showing off and for most guys, their shot glass collection, usually collected from sports bars across the country is one of their most valuable possessions. The price of this items depends on the number of shot glasses you want to display. Some cases that can house more than 150 shot glasses will cost you over $200, while smaller ones, like Harriet Carter Shot Glass Curio will cost you less than $30.

Final Thoughts

Once you set the TV and a comfy chair, it’s definitely time to bask in your accomplishment for a couple of hours. The whole point of this is to have a room where you don’t have to do anything at all for a couple of hours every week.

However, you still have to be careful – you don’t want to get lost there and pack on 25 pounds over the football season – your man cave will only remain special if you look at it as an escape and not a destination.

And how will your spouse react to all of this? If you don’t know what to say, just take a page from Darren Wilson’s book – the guy spent more than 18 months building his personal Bat-Cave from paper mache – and promise that you won’t decorate any more rooms in the house.

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Thanks for stopping by!  Have a wonderful day/night depending on where you are in the world!  Go with God and remember to be kind to one another!   

 

Toodles,