My name is Brandon, and I'm new here (in case you can't tell from my post count). I heard about you guys over on the homerecording.com forums, when asking for help with my studio design.
I have an old barn behind my house that I plan on building into a studio. Most of the barn has recently been rebuilt, because for a long time, it was my father's workshop. Meaning, all the floors, supports, and interior walls are like-new, plus there is an HVAC unit in the main room and the big stable/storage room.
I would like some help turning this into my studio.
I've been doing home recordings for about 11 years now, in my garage, and I'm ready to make my own studio.
I have attached a MSPaint drawing I have created of the barn space. I don't have any design programs, and this is a super old computer, so I doubt I could get a decent one to work on here (P1, 286 MHZ, 3 gigs HD, 128 megs RAM).
Here's some info on the barn.
It was built in 1957 by my father, who had 3 horses at the time. He built it with his bare hands, with the help of friends and neighbors.
The exterior of the barn is made from pine. It was originally built singularly as a barn, so the upper, open storage area has only the outside wall (no insulation), and the stables area, where the horses were kept, has only the outside wall.
The interior of the shop area is fully insulated, and has finished pine interior walls. Most likely, before the construction, those walls will have to come down, because of the control room window(s) I will need, plus a new placement for the main door.
The grey area is a raised area from the rest of the barn. It is approximately 8" higher than the stables to the right, and the wall separating the raised area from the stables is not a ceiling-tall wall; it is only 5' high. It is where the old troughs for the horses' food and water used to rest, and the raised area is where the food, grain, saddles, etc was stored.
The floor in the stables area is a simple rubber/foam mat over cement. It used to be dirt, but my father filled in the area for tool storage after he made the barn into a shop. There are 2 steel support beams in the stables area (as I have drawn). One is 7'5" away from the far right wall, and the upper is 7'3" away from the far right wall.
First, I figured I would tell you my plans, and see what you guys think.
I plan on using the old shop area as the control room. The door on the left wall is currently about 2' off center. I will either completely move it to the northern wall, or I will center it; I'm not entirely sure yet.
On the right wall in the studio, I will cut a space for a viewing window.
The northern storage area, I plan on completely walling in to create the "sitting room," lobby, kitchen-type area.
In the main recording room, I plan to do the following:
I plan on leveling the entire floor to 8" off the surface. I will do the double-floor thing to help improve sound in the room.
I will remove all the "stable" walls, which includes the 5' tall feeding wall, plus the thing walls separating each part of the stable.
I will build a sound-proofed drum booth in the upper-right corner, in almost the exact location of the current, upper-right stable. In the upper left corner, directly next to the drum booth, I will build a vocal booth.
I will then have an almost symmetrical room for other the main recording room (about 15.5 x 15.5). I will probably at some slants to one or two of the walls so as not to have a perfectly rectangular room; plus, I will add padding around the remaining steel support, so as not to cause injuries in case someone runs into it
As far as getting into and out of various places, I think I will build a small foyer on the left side, that is large enough for a door into the control room, and another door into the lobby. I will probably have a separate entrance into the main recording room.
Of course, I realized about 2 days ago that I have absolutely no plans as of yet for a bathroom, so I'm still not sure what to do about that; I don't want to be sending clients into my house to use the john.
Well, that's about it for now. I hope you guys can help me get this thing built.
Cheers!
-Brandon
). 
