Why Should I Listen To You?: Echoes

Probably the single biggest difference after we had finished clearing our stuff out of the downstairs prior to the project was how much more echoey the space was. No carpet, furniture or gratuitously Star Trek video collections to absorb the sound.

Well, it's different now...

Before		Day One
	The family room. Note the fake wood panelling. The irony with this panelling is that the plywood base is quite decent wood, but the melamine facing is what ruins it. The beam in the ceiling will be the dividing wall between the family room and the office.
Look! No more panelling! You can also see the framing for a deeper covering on the underground concrete wall - this room gets cold in the winter, so we want to put some more insulation in here.
The framing for the office wall has gone in already. These guys apparently do not muck about.
	The old laundry area, soon to be meditation room. Moving this laundry area is going to involve some quite aggressive plumbing, since the waste lines are buried in the concrete floor. The marks on the wall are from removing an old set of shelves which we wanted to keep (which are green, but sturdy). The door to the left of this picture will be filled in.
The old utility sink has gone, and the wall behind has been pulled apart in preparation for the plumbing and electrical work required. The framing to fill in the unwanted door has been done too, although it's not visibile in this picture. The cylinder on the right is the water heater.
	The furnace, the stupid furnace that was misinstalled so that it needs to be replaced after only ten years. Aaargh.
Furnace gone. Poor, poor furnace.
This is the floor where the furnace was standing. You can see the rust stains from the misinstallation (a drainage pipe which ran uphill, basically).