Basement Media Centre Organization

Since moving our office downstairs a few months ago, and now that baby loves lying on the floor, we’ve been hanging out in the basement ALL THE TIME.  We even hooked up Netflix to the TV down here (we used to watch solely on the computers) so I’ve been staring at a messy TV console area for a while.  Well not anymore, because I decided to tackle the basement media centre organization – and today I’m sharing the before photos and some planning ideas.

I may have mentioned some of the problem areas that I wanted to address when I first shared the basement tour and future ideas.  Our basement is a sea of brown panelling, and our media centre wasn’t working as nicely as I would have liked (not to mention the sagging shelf).

This has probably been the one project that has dragged on the longest around here.  Not the whole “doing the project” but from the time I thought about it, until I actually started.  You see, that shelf had been drooping for a while – and I really wanted to fix the problem… but just never got around to it.

Actually, I even saved the shelves from the old pantry in our kitchen specifically for this media centre… and over 2 years later, I can finally get around to using them!

I was planning on maybe even painting this DVD cabinet when we refreshed the basement, but then I realized we were only really using half of it.  So we went through all the DVDs (and VHSs!) and got rid of about half of that stuff.

I was hesitant to get rid of the cabinet because the top fit perfectly below the built-in section where we have our TV stuff.  We kept the internet modem/router on top, and some Wii controllers (the Husband put them here – I liked them to be nicely placed in the built-in…).

Since we moved our computers down here, we could move the modem back into the laundry room area where it was before (we got a better signal upstairs when it was outside).  I then had to organize the mess of cables in the back and would you believe it that there were some random old ones plugged in that we were no longer even using!  (And I hate “phantom power” too)

Everything looked much better in the front and back of the built-in, so I was happy we were starting to see progress on the media centre organization.  In case you were wondering, the cables hook up to the outlet in the laundry room, then come through a hole in the wall behind the TV.  The DVD player is the only one that’s cable is too short to reach around that way, so we have it in the front.  (The DVD player in the DVD/VCR combo doesn’t work, but I keep it because I do still use the VCR if you can believe it!).

I then went through and sorted everything based on what we were keeping.  Everything I wanted to get rid of I moved to the bottom shelf, and all the stuff to keep was left on the top.  Then we sold the PlayStation, Xbox 360 and all the games in August and September.  Once we had a lot less stuff (remember, half the movies were gone too) I could finally start to visualize how I wanted to properly use this space.

Here’s a rough diagram of what I’m thinking, and in the next few weeks I’ll be slowly working on everything so that we can use the area to its full potential!  I will be reinforcing the shelves and painting the media centre, adding lots of storage bins for baby’s things (aka future toys) and putting all the DVDs and Wii games in storage boxes too.  I want to completely remove the old DVD tower, and maybe put our bean bag chair there, or some sort of storage basket.

And, exciting news, once I finish the basement media centre organization – I’ll actually be starting to update the ENTIRE basement like I talked about wayyyy at the starting of the year.  I’ve actually decided that I will be painting the panelling (instead of white washing it) and I know I have a lot of work ahead of me.

Anyways, come back next week and I should hopefully be sharing the updated shelving unit!