While it may not be top of mind on your list of home renovations, transforming a disorganized garage into an orderly space can have a significant impact on your life. “Your garage is often the first place you enter when you come home, and having that space strewn about haphazardly can feel chaotic,” explains Charles Shattuck-Heidorn, co-owner of the PremierGarage of Southern Maine. It’s easy to eliminate piles of seasonal gear and holiday decorations, clustered corners stacked with boxes, and dusty floors with simple solutions like cabinets, shelving, hanging storage, and epoxy flooring.
Refreshing neglected concrete floors is an often-disregarded way to upgrade your garage. Adding an epoxy floor not only protects your concrete, but it can also keep your garage much cleaner: while concrete releases dust, epoxy flooring seals everything in and makes your garage a breeze to keep clean. In Project 1 (pictured on the opposite page), a client installing a new garage asked Shattuck-Heidorn to update the home’s older garage with matching epoxy. “The older garage had significant damage to the concrete, primarily cracking and spalling,” Shattuck-Heidorn explains. “We repaired the concrete with specialized mortar and then ground down the pad to create a uniform surface for the epoxy to bond with. The homeowner was left with his older garage looking just as beautiful as the new one.”
Don’t worry if your garage feels like a disaster: it’s common for even the most immaculate homes to have problematic garages. “Our client owns a beautiful home on a lake, and every other space in the home is meticulously maintained, but their garage only had simple shelves and a concrete floor that was cracked and dusty,” says Shattuck-Heidorn. His team at the PremierGarage of Southern Maine set out to elevate the garage’s functionality and align its beauty with the rest of the home (Project 2, pictured above). “Bringing in deep cabinets, a workbench, and slat wall created a space that feels clean and organized, allowing the homeowner to store all their tools and sports equipment,” explains Shattuck-Heidorn. “Plus, the decorative flake of earth tones in the new flooring accents the beauty of the nature around the home.”
If you’re unsure of how you’d like to use your garage in the long term, there are plenty of options to keep it clean and organized. In Project 3 (pictured at right), the homeowners were just moving into their new space and were not yet sure how they intended to use their garage. “We decided to protect the new concrete with epoxy and added a deep storage cabinet, a small workbench, and some slat wall for tool storage,” says Shattuck-Heidorn. When space is available, storage cabinets are a great way to hide seasonal gear. “Whether it’s all the sunblock and hats from the summer or your snowshoes and hockey equipment, a deep cabinet with doors can keep odds and ends out of sight and organized,” he explains. If your garage feels tight on space, Shattuck-Heidorn suggests hanging tools on walls. “Sometimes there is not enough space on a wall to install a cabinet or shelving due to the area vehicles require. Consider adding hanging storage to these walls to store snow shovels, yard rakes, garden hoses, and other relatively slim items.”
Your garage is the first place you enter at home, and having that space strewn about haphazardly can feel chaotic.