When it came time to design the basement of a custom home in Garrett Park, GTM Architects and builder Pat Keating of PKK Builders—who owns the home—pulled out all the stops. In addition to a rec room, guest quarters and a home office, the finished lower level features a gym and a workshop—both distinguished by a stripped-down, industrial aesthetic that Keating wanted but that “we couldn’t get away with in the main living spaces,” he notes.

GTM’s Luke Olson adds, “Pat was looking for cost-effective ways to provide added details, so rather than hanging drywall in the gym, we left the ceiling joists exposed. Clear-coat plywood walls mount equipment and hardware and the wood creates a connection to the outdoors.” Metal-framed ash barn doors close off the gym.

The workshop nods to the methods and materials used on the house, with walls clad in corrugated metal wainscoting and wood panels salvaged from pallets on site. The concrete floor is coated with non-slip epoxy. Like much in the streamlined space, says Olson, “it’s purely for function.”