John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hello,

I just signed in and have been reading other posts over the last few days.
Great site BTW!

I'm in the process of buying a new home, and I'm looking to put my studio in the new home's basement. (one of the reasons for moving)

I'm under the impression that ceiling height is of importance, but how important is my question.

I've got two options to buy:

Existing home's I'm looking at can be found with 9-10 ft. ceilings (to bottom of joists).

Build a home and pay a little extra for either 10 ft. PLUS (they put a 6 in. wall on top of the existing 10 ft. foundation), OR pay MUCH more for a 12 ft. tall foundation.

The basements would by typical American basements, with concrete walls, supports (as pictured in other thread), ductword above, HVAC for house, etc. 1500-2000 sq. ft. in size.

Any ideas???

welcome to the site. Yeah it's a hard one. If you look at Blue Bear Sound you will se the typical North American basement where the problem isn't so much the ceiling height as the huge amount of space and lowering of ceiling height taken up by the HVAC system ductwork.

So I ask - due you necessarily need a basement studio? Why not a Garage studio?

cheers
john

MMazurek,
I am in the same "boat" as you, I'm moving, and that means I need to rebuild my studio in a new house, can't do it in the garage.
Maybe this time I will get it right.

I will be watching this thread closely, I know I will learn a lot from this forum. (i already have)
Myke (DBX160)

The garage studio won't work. The property will have a three car garage filled with two cars, etc... Also, the garage ceilings are finished at 8-9 ft. with rooms above (attached to the house).

The basements I've seen in this area are being dug deeper to accomodate finished basements with 9ft. ceilings. For a 'floating floor/wall' design, I'd probably be capped off at a 9-9 1/2 ft. peak (assuming non-flat ceiling). The 'cement floor to bottom of joists above' could be 10-10 1/2 ft. I assume I will lose the other 1-1 1/2 ft. with ceiling and flooring.

I don't need to isolate from the house above as much as from Control Room to Live Room to ISO booths/VOX booths, etc...

If you can get a 9 - 10 ' ceiling in a basement - go for it then I'd probably take up the ceiling space for isolation to upstairs. The floating floors are for room to room isolation but it is expensive relative to the increase in isolation.

cheers
john

I'll probably utilize your design service once we've settled on something, I'm just trying to plan a little ahead.

Thanks for your opinion.