Today I’m excited to share our new workout space that I just finished. We loved what we had with our Bike+, but after adding the Tread, we needed to move spaces. I love how our Peloton home gym turned out!
As many of you know, I’m a Peloton bike fan. We had it nicely tucked in a cozy corner of our finished basement and I liked the space and how it functioned. There was a full-length mirror, some art, and a storage bench for shoes, cleaning supplies, and tools. Plenty of space for what we needed.
Old Peloton Bike Corner
A couple of months ago, we decided to order the Peloton Tread. As we prepared for delivery of it, I quickly realized (after taking some measurements) that it wasn’t going to fit in the basement area with the bike without being cramped or without enough clearance space.
We had a loft area on our 2nd story that wasn’t being used for anything. We had some old furniture and a TV in there, but it’d been a couple of years since we actually used the room for anything. I hated that it felt like wasted space, so after talking it over with Steve, we decided that it might be a good idea to turn it into a workout space with plenty of room for both pieces of equipment, and plenty of floor space for strength or yoga.
We moved or donated the items that were in the loft, had the Tread delivered there, and had the bike moved.
The biggest challenge to this space is that it’s partially visible from our living room seeing as it’s at the top of the staircase, and it’s also open to our hallway. There are no doors, and I didn’t want it to look like it didn’t flow with the rest of the house. I also didn’t want it to look like a boring beige box.
After scouring the internet for inspiration, I came across this photo on Instagram from designer Allison Ruda and fell in love with the mirror-on-wallpaper concept.
The New Workout Space
I’ll go through the elements individually, but you can also jump to the bottom of this post for a full source list.
Wallpaper
I love bold, colorful wallpaper, but I didn’t want it to be out of character with the rest of the surrounding spaces open to it. So I opted for a more neutral – but still fun – peel and stick wallpaper. Once I saw it, it immediately made me think of “joyful movement,” which is exactly why I have the equipment in the first place.
I shared this process on Instagram Stories, and had so.many.questions about putting up the wallpaper! The wall itself is about 10′ x 9’6, and it took me about 4.5 hours to put it up by myself. As a bit of a perfectionist and also knowing I didn’t have an unlimited amount of wallpaper, I took my time to make sure everything was aligned and adhered well. If you had another set of hands helping, it may be faster. I also think that now that I’ve done it once, it wouldn’t take nearly as long next time. I didn’t find it difficult, it just took time and patience. I will absolutely use peel and stick wallpaper again without hesitation. I was thankful that I didn’t choose a pattern that required absolute straight lines (like a stripe or checkerboard) because I think that would have been much more time-consuming.
Mirror
For the mirror, I spent more time trying to source it than I did putting wallpaper up! I definitely wanted one that was big enough to really stand out against the wallpaper, and provide enough height and width to clearly see full-body during a workout. I first ordered one from Overstock (the same mirror was also most popular on Amazon and Wayfair) and it arrived late and completely shattered. They refunded me and told me to dispose of it, which I wouldn’t have had an easy way to except for luck that we had a crew coming out to take away some old furniture and junk. There was one at CB2 that I liked, but it was back-ordered and had really high shipping costs. Anthropologie is always a top pick when it comes to oversized mirrors, but I didn’t want to spend quite so much, and they were all a little too embellished for what I wanted here. I have a mirror in my formal living room from Ballard that I absolutely love, and remembered that it was delivered extremely securely in a wooden framed box. They had one that was the perfect size and happened to be on sale and with free shipping, so I ordered it. A week later it was delivered and was in perfect condition, even if the box looked worse for wear. I like that it has the option to mount or lean – many oversized mirrors don’t offer mounting hardware. We currently have it leaning, but I may mount it in the future.
Chandelier
Previously, there was an older ceiling fan in the room. I know many of you are going to ask why I decided to get rid of a fan in a workout space, of all places. The answer? My floor fan. It always is blowing directly on me when I exercise, with a breeze so strong that it’s worthy of a Beyonce concert. A ceiling fan could never touch the power of my personal wind tunnel, so it was an easy choice to remove it and replace it with something more aesthetically pleasing.
I originally ordered a pendant from CB2, but it was back-ordered and then delayed another month, so I canceled it and decided to run to our local Ballard Outlet to see what they had. I bought our kitchen island light from the Ballard Outlet and knew they usually had a great selection of fixtures. Low and behold, one of the lights I was eyeing on their site was available in-store for 60{967bf23b37ec6a673a83041540b3f904a815b4119ddf673afb961c1e7592ebdd} off. I love that it makes an impact but also isn’t too dark/heavy for the space. I got the chandelier in champagne finish, but they have a pretty white version as well.
Furniture
I wanted some functional storage pieces that could hold weights, kettlebells, socks, shoes, towels, yoga blocks, cleaning supplies, etc. I already had a storage bench (a HomeGoods find) in my previous area that we moved to the new space. I flanked it with two storage cube organizers and added some 13″ storage baskets. The cube organizers were easy to assemble and are very sturdy.
Window Treatments
I usually prefer to install curtain panels close to the ceiling, but that wasn’t possible in this case with the sloped ceiling. To maximize coverage of the fabric to the sloped part of the wall, I used a French return curtain rod versus a typical rod with finials. I picked neutral panels to add texture, but not compete with the wallpaper or artwork. I attached them with these curtain rings.
For the space in front of the mirror, I have an oversized workout mat on the way that we can use for yoga, strength, or bodyweight exercise. It can be tucked away when not in use. We will eventually update the flooring, but it will be part of an overhaul of all the upstairs flooring.
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