Bill Wade, Post-Gazette The 1,500-foot basement gym at the Niklaus home in Ohio Township gives, from left, Abbey Niklaus, 10, Tony Bevan, 12, Andrew Niklaus, 12, and Jen Ward, 11, plenty of room for dodgeball. Click photo for larger image.

Brian Niklaus would be the first to concede that he and his wife Amy didn't need to finish off the basement of their new house as a playground for their children. With about 6,000 square feet of living space and a 14-acre lot to run around on, Abbey, 10, and Andrew, 11, had plenty of places to play.

But then the couple got to thinking. Did they really want the kids playing ball in the house in the winter? And where would Abbey and Andrew hang out with their friends?

"We decided it might be easier to do something to keep them happy at home," says Amy.

"Something" turned out to be a 1,500-square-foot, unheated gymnasium under the Ohio Township house's four-car garage. There, the children and their friends can play dodge ball, soccer and floor hockey. Andrew, a sixth-grader at Avonworth Middle School, occasionally sets up a baseball net on the red-and-gray checked floors for pitching and batting practice.

Abbey, meanwhile, can play pool, watch a movie on the big-screen TV in the adjacent family room or roll out the rubber mats stacked in the corner to practice gymnastics.

"It's great," says Brian, a builder and real estate agent. "We can close the door, and you can't hear them in the rest of the house."

He estimates the gym -- which is about 3 feet deeper than the rest of the basement -- added about $20,000 to the total cost of construction.

Robin Rombach, Post-Gazette A home in Bradford Woods was designed with many youth-oriented ideas in the basement, including a dance floor. "We figured that if there was enough stuff to keep the kids interested, they'd be happy to stay home with their friends and socialize," says one of the parents. Click photo for larger image.

Kid-friendly features include murals of sports figures by Ben Avon artist Bob Vilseck on the gym's concrete walls, even a urinal in the full bath (boys are notoriously messy).

Lots of parents want to keep their children close to home, especially during those turbulent teenage years. Most often, that means turning a basement or rec room into a hangout with a pool table or foosball table, television, stereo system, maybe even a computer to play games.

A space for children

But some families go all out with cushy home theaters, elaborate sport courts, and special rooms for playing cards or board games. What matters most, it seems, is that the space truly belongs to the kids (i.e., no parents allowed), and that it's cool enough for their friends to want to hang out there.

Consider the basement of a new 8,000-square-foot home in Bradford Woods. Designed specifically for the couple's three children, who range in age from 7 to 13, it's filled with all kinds of fun stuff. For the sports nuts, there's an ESPN game station with six sports, including foosball and basketball, as well as laser tag equipment. There's also a spacious TV area with plush couches and a cozy gas fireplace and nearby, two built-in bookcases filled with more than a dozen board games.

When the kids get tired of being couch potatoes, they can work up a sweat under a mirrored disco ball on the dance floor, which adjoins a full kitchen with a dishwasher, fridge and sink. Or they can lift weights or hop on the treadmill in the mirrored exercise room.

	Robin Rombach, Post-Gazette Foosball is one of the attractions in this large finished basement in Bradford Woods. Click photo for larger image.

The biggest kid-pleaser, however, may be the state-of-the-art screening room, which is large enough for 30 kids.

"We figured that if there was enough stuff to keep the kids interested, they'd be happy to stay home with their friends and socialize," says one of the parents, who asked not to be identified.

Some people might consider such an investment of money and space extravagant (at 2,500 square feet, the basement is larger than some houses) but for the homeowners, it "just made sense."

"They feel like they have privacy and time to be by themselves, which is important," she says. "But we can still keep an eye on them, which is just as important."

To make the house a kid-magnet in warmer months, the couple is also considering installing an LCD projector in the backyard, which already has outdoor speakers and has been wired for cable. So the kids and their friends can watch movies outside in the dark, just like at the drive-in. That is, if they're not already enjoying a game of volleyball on the open field next to the in-ground swimming pool.

Extravagant to the max

Pardee Homes' Ultimate Family Home, which was introduced at last year's International Builders Show in Las Vegas, is even more extravagant. Along with a jungle-inspired tree house that deposits kids via a faux-rock water slide into the swimming pool, this four-bedroom, 5,300-square-foot Spanish-style home features a "home management center" off the kitchen with homework/computer stations for two children.

The third-story loft, meanwhile, has a plasma TV suspended from the ceiling so youngsters can play games or watch TV. Downstairs in the kitchen, a beverage center built into an island provides easy access to snacks.

Family oriented spaces, where Mom and Dad are welcome to join in the fun, include an outdoor pavilion with a gas fireplace, grill and three televisions and a family workshop area in the air-conditioned garage, complete with a sound system and another plasma TV. There's also separate areas for foosball, ping-pong and tetherball.

According to Bassenian & Lagnoi Architects, which designed the home, many of the ideas came from focus groups with children ages 8 to 16.

A great makeover

Fine, you say. That might be doable if you're building a house from scratch. But what if you're looking to expand the livability of an older home? The total basement remodel one Mt. Lebanon couple undertook last year to create a hip hangout for their 16-year-old twins might provide some inspiration.

Previous owners had finished parts of the four-room basement several decades before with '70s-style wood paneling, a head-banging low ceiling and the boiler, water heater and wash tubs in plain view.

Working with Tommarello general contractors and architect James Kopriva, the couple transformed the dark and dreary space into one large, attractive game room their children (and their high school friends) can't wait to spend time in.

"There are a lot of distractions out there for kids," says the homeowner, who asked to remain anonymous. "We figured we'd rather have them here than at the mall."

The original game room now serves as the media center, with a 51-inch television, built-in bookcases and a queen-sized sleeper sofa. A brightly lit bar area lies two steps up, and features a custom bar by Harbor Place Wood Craft of Bethel Park with granite countertops, sink with disposal, built-in dishwasher and fridge stocked with soda.

The basement, which is decorated with framed sports memorabilia, also contains a pool table, foosball table and electronic dart board. There's also a spare room that opens onto a small patio and will probably eventually be used as a home gym.

Knowing that kids like to listen to music -- but not always at the same time -- the couple had Goosebumps of McMurray install a stereo system with zoned sound, which allows the kids to turn the music on or off in separate parts of the basement.

The coolest area, though, is the snug little poker room. Originally used as a tasting room for the adjoining wine cellar, it boasts stone walls with grapes in high relief.

The biggest part of the project, which took about six months, involved lowering the floor by 18 inches. The contactors also had to remove a weight-bearing wall under the living room and put in a support beam.

The project ended up costing about $125,000, but the homeowners consider it money well spent. The kids make good use of it, with friends over nearly every day of the week. That's good news not only for the twins and their friends but also for their friends' parents.

"When they tell them they're coming to our house to hang out, they know exactly what they'll be doing."

To see photos of the Ultimate Family Home, visit www.pardeehomes.com/ufh/pr03_ufhb_building.php and click on "photo gallery."