One of the most commonly remodeled rooms in a homeowner’s house is the kitchen. In fact, most kitchens are updated at least once per homeowner. According to Legal Eagle Contractors, because kitchens are one of the most heavily trafficked rooms with occupants entering them more than 1,000 per year per person, it only makes sense that a kitchen is updated at least every 10 years.
But some homeowners prefer to create a wet bar in their finished basement, a sort of gallery kitchen meets bar, a fun place to hang out and entertain guests. A wet bar usually includes the common kitchen essentials such as cabinetry, countertop, sink, and faucet, plus various convenient under-the-counter appliances.
One homeowner decided to create a wet bar in his basement with an incredibly unique twist. The end result is amazing!
He and his team of helpers constructed the wet bar’s foundation with two large pieces of quality 5/8-inch plywood with rails made out of 1 1/2-inch poplar. They were notched with a table saw and hand routed, then painted matte black with spray cans of Rustoleum.
While the finish didn’t need to look perfect, it had to be level or else the epoxy resin he planned to use would pool up in low spots, he noted.
The homeowner, his friends and family saved 2,530 beer bottle caps during a five-year period. He envisioned creating a wet bar countertop out of those colorful bottle caps. The caps came from domestic, craft and imported drinks.
“The initial concept was to lay out an image comprised of bottle caps. Then reality set in and we opted for the much easier gradient effect.”
He and his team of helpers decided to follow the rainbow’s sequence of colors called ROYGBIV: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. It took them approximately four hours and multiple attempts to attain the perfect look.
“Initially I was being pretty anal about cap alignment, color disbursement etc. In the end, we decided to introduce entropy and New Holland’s Dragon’s Milk, which I feel was the secret ingredient. Visually, we felt it would be more interesting dispersing various caps to add pops of color … you can see how we laid them out allowing the caps to ‘flow’ into each other, rather than having hard color stops.”
After arranging the bottle caps into the perfect design, he covered them with five layers of epoxy resin to connect everything together and provide a waterproof seal.
“This resin fills any available airspace. It was better to just pour the resin slowly making thin layers, not thick enough to cover the caps.”
After the epoxy dried over the bottlecaps, the finished look was amazing!
“I am so proud of this project. It is a real conversation piece and we did it together, true DIY.”
Other impressive wet bar concepts include using round seat cushions on kegs to make barstool seats and using recycled beer cans to make track lighting. Some homeowners have affixed bottlecaps to their backsplash while others used wine caps to create the words “bar” as a decorative element.
A repurposed wine barrel can be converted into a mini-fridge or a storage unit. The possibilities are endless!
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