Post #773055 by Ragbag Comics on Thu, Feb 16, 2017 4:00 PM

Thanks hiltiki!

Here's a few pictures of the far corner of the bar we're calling (at least for now) the Mermaid's Cove... less due to a burst of creative inspiration, and mostly due to the big mermaid.

We'll be adding some other random flotsam and jetsam to the ceiling here - probably a puffer lamp and some smaller hanging floats. The ceiling over the door is REALLY low (like, I hit my head on it every time I go back there low) so there's not a ton of leeway with what can hang there (much like the rest of the basement.) The lamp that IS there is one of those shell thingies you see in Chinese restaurants pretty often, just with a light in it.

The whole basement is traditional Wisconsin knotty pine paneling... it was DEFINITELY something we didn't want to cover up entirely. We opted to keep this side of the bar (and the area behind the bar and the mug shelves) as-is. We thought it felt like you're on a boat, which seems appropriate...

Here's an overall view with the overhead lights on:

We had to do that for the photo, cuz this is what it looks like with that main light off:

With some small ancillary lights around the shell one, and a few strategically placed accents, I think it should lighten up just enough to see where you're going!

We wanted to go with a nautical look over here, but also bring in some of that enthnographic stuff... so I found some old Ripley's photos and pictures of old timey guys playing with shrunken heads that sorta carry that through:

I plan to add stick-on letters for the ship from Creature from the Black Lagoon (the "Rita" to the bottom of our life preserver. In this picture, too, you can see an ear trophy thing I put together. Someone was selling something VERY similar on Etsy, which was really, really cool... but at $115 shipped, I couldn't really justify the price. I found a quality halloween prop ear necklace online for $10 (thanks, Walking Dead, for creating a market for such a thing) and with some burlap and a $10 shadowbox from Michael's, we have something similar. Someday we'll probably spring for the "real" one, but for now I feel like this looks just fine:

All the lamps are re-wired, and the ceiling is painted. This weekend we attempt to build the main wall of mug shelves as well as the bump-out to cover up the electrical panels.

Wish us luck - we are not craftsmen, by a longshot!

--Pete