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Ideas for painting man cave/ISU room? (Share your pictures!)

cycloneinpdx

cycloneinpdx

Member
Jul 10, 2013
237
11
18
Twin Cities
The wife and I are closing on our first home at the end of the month, if everything goes as planned. We are discussing paint options and I get the large basement room as a man cave, at least until our family starts to grow. I want to paint it in cardinal and gold, but the wife doesn't want it to "look like a dorm room."

Any ideas on how to pull a classy, yet cyclone themed room? There are no real windows to speak of, its a long and narrow room, with the painted foundation on the long wall and end of the room, with the second long wall broken up by a of couple doors and an open closet area.

She wants to paint the wall behind the tv (and massive TV stand) cardinal and gold horizontal stripes, but I really don't care to go through the work to hide it behind the tv. I want to paint the long wall cardinal with gold vertical stripes at the midpoint, imitating the throwback jerseys (though the ceiling is low and so it may not look good in execution), and she doesn't think that is a good idea.

Any tips on what you have found to look good or even pictures of your space would be super helpful.
 
I think the bookstore sells ISU wallpaper border so what we did was paint the top 12 inches to the ceiling Gold, then the wallpaper under that, and below that was Cardinal paint. It turned out very nice. Also, most paint places like Sherwin Williams in Iowa have the official ISU Cardinal and ISU Gold paint mix already so be sure to request it!
 
Paint 3 walls (2 long walls and one short one - not with the big screen) Cardinal on the bottom and gold/yellow on top, about 2/3 and 1/3. Paint the 4th wall (behind the TV) solid gold/yellow or solid Cardinal. A chair rail/trim at the break line is optional. That gives you the lighter color on the top and you can hang whatever posters/photos/memorabilia in the lighter top third. Should look pretty good.
 
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My tip is to do whatever you think you're going to do right away, otherwise you'll sit on that project for years.
 
MNCyGuy said:
My tip is to do whatever you think you're going to do right away, otherwise you'll sit on that project for years.
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This. This. This.

Or all of a sudden those snot-bubbling, pants-crapping, screamers will be there filling your "man-cave" with easy bake ovens and legos..
 
CycloneGB said:
This. This. This.

Or all of a sudden those snot-bubbling, pants-crapping, screamers will be there filling your "man-cave" with easy bake ovens and legos..
Click to expand...

I'm cool with the legos. And I also probably play with that little tikes hoop more than he does. But yea, pretty much this.
 
We painted our basement yellow and red (although less intense than our school colors), ISU memorabilia on a shelf, and framed posters on the walls. The jack trice jersey is a nice addition.

agree 100% with doing it right away. We've lived in our house 5+ years and there are still things we are "getting to"
 
MNCyGuy said:
I'm cool with the legos. And I also probably play with that little tikes hoop more than he does. But yea, pretty much this.
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Whats your record distance? Ive sunk some pretty incredible **** with that hoop.
:smile:
 
bos said:
Whats your record distance? Ive sunk some pretty incredible **** with that hoop.
:smile:
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I think it would be a lot better if the ceiling wasn't so low down there. That low light fixture is my personal Dikembe Mutombo.
 
WhatMeWorry said:
Google Iowa State Color palette and you'll get the formulas for the exact colors.

Here is one:
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...Ro_F5pqTlt1R53OP26RFTRQ&bvm=bv.59026428,d.b2I
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To clarify, that is for the university...not the athletics department. Athletics identity can be found here:
http://www.cyclones.com/pdf3/91103.pdf

Whatever you do, don't paint every wall solid Cardinal/Gold. That would likely turn out very heavy and very "dorm room". Use the accent colors in the athletics identity package linked here. That will give it ISU flair, without the primary/bold colors.

Here are some other accent colors you can sprinkle in, and there are a few colors in here that could serve as a neutral wall color instead of just plain white. Using this color palette as a guideline could help sub in ISU authenticity without restricting yourself to Cardinal and Gold, and getting too dorm room:
Visual Identity System
 
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Also, most paint places like Sherwin Williams in Iowa have the official ISU Cardinal and ISU Gold paint mix already so be sure to request it!
Click to expand...

Unfortunately I am in western Nebraska so the local sherwin probably won't have that in stock! But I got one of the throwback jerseys and I think I am going to have them match the colors from it.
 
If you're not already locked in, try and get in touch with Mangino, he seems excited for these types of remodeling projects.

:wink:
 
cycloneinpdx said:
Unfortunately I am in western Nebraska so the local sherwin probably won't have that in stock! But I got one of the throwback jerseys and I think I am going to have them match the colors from it.
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Use that athletics page link and take the color numbers into anywhere you can get paint and they can match it.
 
Why not darken the official red and use it on one wall only and leave the gold (yellow) alone? Paint the other walls a neutral tan (a.k.a. actual gold/tan color like the 49ers), since it's a narrow, windowless room. Conceptually, this would match the majority of the 1920s jerseys, which were tan pants with red jerseys. (For example, when making our shirts, I favored the vintage Cardinal, which was a darker red pantone 202, versus the brighter 187.)
 
I just got done painting our logo on my man cave wall. I did it all by measuring, drawing, and taping off sections at a time. It took me for-freaking-ever, and was a giant pain the ***, but I eventually got it done after about a year of working on it on and off. It's about 5 feet wide and 3-4 feet tall. My "man cave" is really just our 4th bedroom in our basement. Not real big. I just have a futon, 2 TVs, Xbox One, etc. ISU stuff I have in it so far are:

- ISU Football helmet
- 4 mini helmets (still need a couple more)
- Framed autographed pictures of Jake and AJ
- Basketball autographed by CFH, Royce, Diante, Brackins, so far
- Football autographed by CPR
- Framed JTS picture from Iowa 44-41 3OT game with rushed field


That's it for now. I have some pictures of the logo I painted, but can't post right now. I'll add them later.
 
297402_10100257155061160_1914565394_n.jpgHere is what I did on one wall of our basement bar area. I designed the image in PhotoShop and then used a projector attached to a laptop to display it on the wall. From there I traced it and painted it using official ISU colors. Turned out really great!
 
Apparently I'm on the other end of the spectrum, but go with a neutral and let your memorabilia be the decoration. Less is more.
 
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