Hula Sue's South Seas Hideaway

Hi Everyone,
I've been a lurker on this site for over a year--admiring the many talented artists at work here. You guys are truly inspiring.
I've been planning to build a Tiki Room in my basement for quite some time and finally amassed most of the materials to do so. The working name for the room is 'Hula Sue's South Seas Club' (for my wife) and will be what we’re considering a part Enchanted Tiki room, part Hawaii 'simulator' and uh…part other stuff.
I was lucky enough to find (listed on Craigslist) a bamboo covered (interior) Chinese restaurant in Tacoma that was being renovated, and got a free truckload of whole and split bamboo poles. Felt just like hitting the lottery (you know, if the lottery gave a bunch of bamboo to the winner). I had to steel wool the old peeling varnish off of miles of poles but it was worth it. I found a great restaurant corner booth and some nice rattan and bamboo furniture on Craigslist as well.

I started by framing in walls over the concrete (following the weeks it took to clean the place out). The short flight of stairs down to the basement will be surrounded by lava cave entrance with bamboo railings that terminate in Tiki Pole newel posts. There will be fake windows behind the bar with a large, rear-lit photo backdrop (from panoramic pics I took on vacation) of our favorite Hawaiian beach (Tunnels Beach on Kauai) set back into the adjoining storage room for depth.
On the walls, I’ll be using a combination of bamboo, matting and Tapa and I’ve made some baseboard and trim inspired…er…ripped-off from the likes of the legendary Bamboo Ben and others on the site (I just love the way the wood looks when you torch and wire-brush it to get the weather-worn raised-grain look—like some of that woodwork in Fantasyland).

Anyway, I’m just getting started (and by that I mean I’m several months in) but I thought I would post and document my progress—and hopefully solicit some great input/ideas/inspiration from all of you. I’ve already learned much from many of you on this site.
Mahalo!
John…er….I mean Mr. Pupu Pants

[ Edited by: Mr. Pupu Pants 2009-06-18 15:43 ]

Wow this looks like an amazing project. Good find on the bamboo poles. And the restaurant booth.
Looks like a great space to build your tiki room.

Keep them updates coming.

Mahalo

I wish British houses had basement rooms...

I wish Austrian Houses didn't.
But more on topic, I really like the carved panels, keep us posted on the progress

Looking like you're off to a great start :D Cant wait to seeit progress

Nice work so far, I can already tell this will be a great home tiki bar. It already looks better than some of the "completed" tiki bars I've seen.

i'm glad you've de-lurked! what an awesome motherload of bamboo!! we're in seattle ~ hope to meet up with you soon!!

remember to take many progression pics and post as often as you can (with Mai Tai in hand)!

looks like good fun for good times!

Wonderful! I can tell this is going to be great tiki room. Did you use a router for the baseboards and trim? They look great! I’d like to do something similar.

Keep us posted. Aloha and welcome to TC.

Beautiful Tunnels Beach, Kauai.

MrsHoptiki

Welcome to TC...love the user name. Yep...you are well on your way to a fabulous lounge...your lurking served you well. All your plans sound great and you are lucky to have such a roomy basement. Keep up the great work. :)

Looks awesome! I love some of your Craigslist finds. God Bless Craigslist!

Please keep us posted with regular photo updates.

On 2008-05-02 00:24, Mr. Pupu Pants wrote:

Anyway, I’m just getting started (and by that I mean I’m several months in)

Mr PuPu,

Need it done in 10 days? :wink:

great progress shots, great spot, awesome collection of pieces. Yours is definately one to watch. This is going to be nice!

have fun with it!!! (looks like you already are!)

Thank you all very much for the nice comments. I've had so much fun working on this and it's nice to be able to share it with like-minded, encouraging folks like you. It's been kind of like building my own little piece of Disneyland--which is what I've day-dreamed about since I was a kid. Wow, I sound like a sap.
Anyway-
MrsHopTiki-I did use a router for the 'carving' in the panels so I'm a big cheater :)
It's so cool to think that you can take a regular old 2 x 4 or 2 x 6 and carve some lines into it, burn it, scrape it and stain it and end up with something that looks good.

Bamboo Ben--I'm not worthy :)

Hey, I found a cool thing on Ebay the other day that will work for something I've been planning. I want to have singing tiki heads built into columns like the Enchanted Tiki room and I found these to use as the mechanisms. I bought 4 of them for $10.00 each.

They have an aux input for running a microphone or audio line feed so the 'faces' can 'sing' along with whatever you want. I'll mount mechanisms inside the columns behind the carved tiki faces and attach a lightweight faux-wood lower lips/mouth. When I play Enchanted tiki room songs or anything else they'll flap their mouths and sing right along.
I'll post more pics soon. Thanks again for the kind words!

Wow, that is going to be one sweet retreat!

I feel you're a kindred spirit Pupu. Disneyland is a worthy inspiration (or Disney World as it's called round my parts).

I don't have a basement or spare room to convert into my theme park, so I'm using what little backyard I have. I can see you are working along the same lines as I am in your project - it's the details that make up the whole. Coincidentally, we had a party today in the backyard and my friend who is a great woodsmith gave me a nice compliment (without even knowing my affinity for Disney). He said "from every angle you always see something new, just like at Disneyworld."

It's easy to see that you will achieve the same effect in time. I've been at my backyard for lots of weekends for going on 2 years now, and am maybe 50% done (although when your outside it's easy to work for a couple hours and then admire your handiwork from the hammock for the next six). When people tell me I could do this kind of thing for a living I say: "yeah, just find me someone who can wait 5 years for a finished project." When I hired a tile guy to do my pool tiles and pavers, and he and his crew came in and finished in 8 or 9 days I remember thinking: "What fun is that? I could have had a good six months of laying tile!"

My guess is that as soon as you "finish," you'll have to start "updating." At least that's what I'll need to do - I know I won't be able to go cold turkey!

Anyway, don't rush it - the journey is almost all the fun!

And one more thing, more pics!

[ Edited by: etohliver 2008-05-03 17:58 ]

great start, will be keeping an eye on this thread for sure!

look forward to seeing what you do with that freaky eye thing too.

Mr. PuPu Pants,

First of all, your name is funnier than anything that me & the missus has ever heard. We're laughing right now.

Second, your work on the basement rocks! We were floored by your baseboards! It's impressive how you've managed to get so many oddball things to work together so well. At least the equal of most tiki bars.

Keep up the fantastic work.

You obviously have a broad variety of skills and a very new to T.C., maybe you could tell us a little about yourself, your influences, and the skills we haven't seen?

On 2008-05-04 16:22, Robb Hamel wrote:
and the skills we haven't seen?

Keep it PG.

On 2008-05-04 16:22, Robb Hamel wrote:
You obviously have a broad variety of skills and a very new to T.C., maybe you could tell us a little about yourself, your influences, and the skills we haven't seen?

Sure Robb, allow myself to introduce.....my.....self..... :)
I usually have some kind of project going (often more than one) because I just like to 'make stuff'--- whether it's a short film (editing one for a festival right now for my brother) or a themed room in my house or a prop or set for our yearly Halloween display. I'm also a big Disneyland fan and always wanted to have a house where different rooms were themed like different 'lands'. We've got a number of rooms in various stages of 'construction' (as time and budget allows). I was one of those guys who always tried to look behind the 'curtain' on the rides at Disneyland to try and figure out how they did an effect so I could try to make something like it at home. My brother and I used to walk around the back of the park and crawl through those big flowery bushes to peer through the fence and try to see 'behind the scenes'. It was sheer magic to us.

In addition to the Tiki room I'm building in the basement, we're turning our kitchen into a diner with things like a chrome candy counter, cash register and lighted menu board (and I'll be installing a tin ceiling in the near future).
Our Living room is Victorian themed (Main Street USA :). The master Bedroom is sort of a Swiss Family Robinson's Treehouse room. It has a large bamboo bed, ship's wheel, ship's lanterns, floats, bamboo trim, wainscotting, etc. My den/craft room is in the process of becoming a Cowboy/Frontierland themed room with log cabin walls and a fake fireplace with one of those 1950s fake buring logs (and my animation desk -- didn't cowboys have those?). The downstairs rec room will eventually be a Sci Fi themed movie theater.

I've done a bit of 2D animation for film/video productions at work (film/video production for Microsoft) but my brother, Tom, is a director at Dreamworks (Madagascar) and is currently working on the sequel. He also does the voice of Skipper, the lead penguin, in the movie. Really proud of him.

When we were growing up in the '70's, we used to make stop-motion animated shorts and our own little adventure' films with a Super 8 camera. My heroes were people like Ray Harryhausen, George Pal and L.B. Abbott. At the time, we were the only kids we knew who made movies so it seemed kind of special. Not that the films we made were anything special :)

For me, it seems as though it's usually about 'putting on a show' -- in one way or another. Whether it's making a short film or building a tiki room for family and friends. The process is the fun part -- and it's always fun when you can put a smile on someone's face.
Blah, blah, blah.....anyway, that's probably waaay too much about me

I just want to add that I love this website because of all you 'creators' of cool stuff. I am humbled by the sheer volume of talent here and appreciate the opportunity to share the enthusiasm.
Glad to be here and I hope you're all having a great day.
John

fascinating read.

now that you've mentioned it, you may as well sneak a couple of pics of your other rooms onto this thread as well.

Your house sounds so fun. Please post pictures of your other 'lands'!

our house sounds like my dream house. I love the idea of different themes in the rooms - especially the 50's/60's western theme. I walked into a house in Torrance years ago, that had a giant western themed mural straight out of the 50's. I can only imagine what the place looked like back then. Since then, I've been fascinated with escapist decorating.

I too, would love to see shots of your other rooms, I bet their fantastic!

Thanks for the bio.

I never thought I'd meet another human being who knew who Leonard B Abbott was! I'm a fanatic about the 1933 King Kong: Mario Larrinaga is my absent master. If you're coming to the Hukilau we'll have to talk each other's ears off.

You shouldn't talk about others' creativity - yours is obvious from this post.

Sorry I haven't posted a picture in a bit. Here's a recent one and I'll be posting more progress very soon

Hey Robb, I'm a huge fan of 'old school' effects. The digital stuff done today is amazing but to me, nothing beats the look of a well-done model or a good in-camera effects shot (imho). Even when it doesn't quite look real, it still has it's own cool reality. I guess I just really appreciate the hand-made aspect of it. I still try to do things that way at work if I can get away with it. :)

Speaking of Mr. Abbott, have you ever read his book 'Special Effects: Wire Tape and Rubber Band Style'. Great book. Early issues of Cinefex are great for that stuff too. I've gotten that magazine since the first issue. My brother and I did lots of experimentation on super 8--from double exposures to scratching/animating laser beams onto the emulsion side of the film.(Oop, forgot I was posting on Tiki Central there for a second)........and...uh....there were tikis....um...everywhere!

Harro, Sparklegem, Polynesiac, I'll try to take a few house pics this week although I kinda want to wait until those rooms are completely done.

Thanks again for the nice comments and feedback you guys.

I haven't seen Abbott's book, hafta look it up. I have the first 20 years of Cinfex, and have done the film-scratch laser beams also.

The room looks beyond awesome!

Looks Great! Seems like you got an amazing start. Can't wait to see more pics of the progress.
Cheers

Beautiful. thanks for the update!

On 2008-05-03 17:53, etohliver wrote:
Wow, that is going to be one sweet retreat!

I feel you're a kindred spirit Pupu. Disneyland is a worthy inspiration (or Disney World as it's called round my parts).

I don't have a basement or spare room to convert into my theme park, so I'm using what little backyard I have. I can see you are working along the same lines as I am in your project - it's the details that make up the whole. Coincidentally, we had a party today in the backyard and my friend who is a great woodsmith gave me a nice compliment (without even knowing my affinity for Disney). He said "from every angle you always see something new, just like at Disneyworld."

It's easy to see that you will achieve the same effect in time. I've been at my backyard for lots of weekends for going on 2 years now, and am maybe 50% done (although when your outside it's easy to work for a couple hours and then admire your handiwork from the hammock for the next six). When people tell me I could do this kind of thing for a living I say: "yeah, just find me someone who can wait 5 years for a finished project." When I hired a tile guy to do my pool tiles and pavers, and he and his crew came in and finished in 8 or 9 days I remember thinking: "What fun is that? I could have had a good six months of laying tile!"

My guess is that as soon as you "finish," you'll have to start "updating." At least that's what I'll need to do - I know I won't be able to go cold turkey!

Anyway, don't rush it - the journey is almost all the fun!

And one more thing, more pics!

[ Edited by: etohliver 2008-05-03 17:58 ]

Hi Etohliver, I've been meaning to respond to your post above. Definitely kindred spirits here. My family and many of our closest friends are Disneyland nuts. I've made the trip down to Disneyland more times than I'm willing to admit. My wife and two sons are right with me :) My brother went to an animation school founded by Disney in Southern Cal called Cal Arts to begin his career. A friend of ours used to animate for Disney in the '70s when the last of the nine old men were still there working (he ended up with a huge neon sign from a tiki bar that used to sit across the street from Disney Studios called the Pago Pago. It's now in his backyard--outside his own little tiki bar).

I usually take alot of pictures when I'm down there (including many architectural) to use later when I'm building things. You never know when a good reference photo might come in handy (and who does it better then Disney did). I usually always try to put my own twist on it though. It's all about the details and, even if you don't notice them individually, they definitely contribute in a big way to the overall effect. 'The whole is definitely greater than the sum of it's parts' with things like Tiki bars. Or is it 'Sum parts are greater than whole ones'? Something like that.

Another project I'll be working on later this summer (or possibly next year for budgetary reasons :) ) is a backyard deck (as though it were a tropical dock bordered with facades of different hut and building fronts built onto the back of our house.
In fact, that project is what got me building the tiki room when it was originally going to be built into the back of our garage (which also would border the deck/dock), It would have had flip-up window/awnings to make it open-air for parties in the summer. I'd love to see pics of your backyard for inspiration.

For practical reasons, we decided to use the basement for the tiki bar so, at some point, I still might build an exterior storm cellar entrance to the basement from the backyard so you can easily access it from the deck (maybe I'll make it look like a lava tube or something.

Anyhoo, I'm totally with you on the journey being much of the fun. I also jump back and forth from one project to another (to the occasional dismay of my wife) but they all get done eventually. Or at least to a phase I can call done -- before I'm officially in the 'updating' phase. :wink: There must be some union rules about that.

Thanks again for the comments. Really nice to meet you,
John

Nice work!! Can't wait to see the finished product.

On 2008-05-14 11:25, Mr. Pupu Pants wrote:
A friend of ours used to animate for Disney in the '70s when the last of the nine old men were still there working (he ended up with a huge neon sign from a tiki bar that used to sit across the street from Disney Studios called the Pago Pago. It's now in his backyard--outside his own little tiki bar).

Can you possibly post a picture of that sign over in this thread? In fact, your friend and his sign are mentioned in that thread. And if you can get any info (or even better, pictures!) from your friend about the Pago Pago, that would be great too.

And nice work you're doing here. I'll definitely be watching your progress!

Sure, I'll post a response over on the other thread. :)

It's been awhile since PuPu has posted, I bet when he returns, it'll be with another astounding update on his wild basement... unless he has been bitten by a lethal viper or spider while clearing rainforest looking for that perfect piece of exotic wood for his project.

very cool projects- all insperational; can't wait to see more pics of the basement. don't have them here in fl, (mostly) but we do have the great outdoors- slowly working on my own escapist getaway in my backyard. it'll be a while before i get to most of the small details, but sites like yours keep me frothing; can't wait to see the mechanized tikis!! i have to repeat the others- more pics please!! welcome!!!!

Wow, a little bamboo on the wall and I can already tell this project is going to be amazing. Your approach is a little different than mine, seems like everything is pretty well planned. What a score with the restaurant discards, I gotta keep a closer eye on craigslist!!

Hi Guys, sorry it's been so long since I last posted. I've been working away in my basement and have some new pics to add. The newest portion is made up of alot of different sizes of burnished bamboo, matting and carved/burned/stained 2 x 4's and 2 x 6's. My little propane torch has been very busy.

The corner between the two styles of walls will be where one of the 'support' columns will be located that contain some of the 'talking tiki' carvings mentioned in an earlier post.

I started by building out the base moulding with two layers of 2 x 6 which were carved/burned/stained/polyed to create a wide foundation for the various sizes of bamboo that would sit on them. The 'moulding near the ceiling is made of 2 x 4's in the same fashion and double stacked for width like the bottom. I then nailed up firring strips on the lower part of the wall to have a solid base to nail on the burnished 1" bamboo.

I used Contact Cement to glue up the matting (and really babysat it while it dried to make sure there was no separation from the wall). It adhered perfectly. To keep the matting as square as possible when cutting, I marked the section and then applied gaffer's tape (cloth tape used in film/video production) -or you could use duct tape -- to both sides of the place to be cut. This also kept it from fraying and made it so much easier.

I divided the wall into sections with split 3-4" bamboo that I scorched to dark brown. I nailed on the 1" bamboo to the lower half of the wall to create the wainscotting. I then capped it with split and shaped bamboo (to join to the dark brown beams). I used smaller stuff (1/2") for trim and gap coverage.

On top of the uppermost carved moulding, I secured burnished 6" bamboo to look like load bearing bamboo ceiling joists that smaller bamboo crossbeams will 'tie' onto later.

Here are a couple pics of a portion of the stuff I have collected to decorate 'Hula Sue's'.

Next up is the booth area in the background of the 1st picture above. It will be a hut with the back wall curved and built as a large map that resembles the cover of the Don the Beachcomber menu.
I am having an absolute blast. Hope you guys are all having a great week,
John

[ Edited by: Mr. Pupu Pants 2009-06-18 15:44 ]

Fantastic work! Great job on the joinery with the bamboo. The WWII military models are an interesting touch, don't know that I've seen anyone add Hawaii wartime memorabilia in the mix - but I think it will work.

Thanks very much TikiZen :)
Yeah, the theme I'm trying to put together is of an 'old' Tiki bar that may have existed during WWII and still has remnants of those times as well. I've tried to collect some cool Hawaii-WWII memorabilia to include in decorating the room. It will also have a touch of Enchanted Tiki room thrown in for good measure.
The music I plan to play in there will be a mix of tradtional Hawaiian standards and 1940's band era. I just love that kind of vibe :) Relaxing and warm and a great place to hang out with family and friends.
Thanks again for the encouragement. Mahalo and Aloha!

[ Edited by: Mr. Pupu Pants 2008-06-11 15:11 ]

[ Edited by: Mr. Pupu Pants 2008-06-11 22:52 ]

Dear Tiki God! You're gonna make the Mai Kai look sad if you keep this up. If I ever make it to your area, you'e gotta let me see this place.

It's not like there aren't enough kool tiki rooms to inspire my sorry butt, but I think I just found another one. Awesome work! I'm blown away. I'll be looking forward to your updates like a Tom Corbett serial! Keep 'em coming!

Crapola MrPPP...your building skills are totally awesome. Great blend of textures and very professional looking. I am like you in that I have a different theme going on in every room of my house. My house is new (only two years old) so thank goodness I do need to do any reconstruction...just decorate (well....and spend money). My master bedroom is Egyptian and just finishing up the master bath in a safari theme. I have a diner thing going on my kitchen too.

Your lounge is going to be over-the-top...keep posting pics....love it.

Thanks you guys. I really appreciate it. I hadn't heard anything since posting a couple weeks ago so I thought people were already bored with the post. I knew I should have added explosions or something.

Yikes, it's been a long time since I posted anything.
Here are some newer pictures of what I've been doing (sorry about the mess :).

The booth in the back will be inside a hut and the wall will have a large relief map of Hawaii. The water will be painted with shades of sparkly blue paint and the Islands and icons will be chalkware.

Here's a very rough example of the relief map I made in Photodraw to give you an idea:

The bar will be located where the white outline is on the floor and the cutouts on the wall will be windows to a lighted background of Tunnels Beach (Kauai) with a foreground, forced perspective diorama:

The spot with the unfinished vertical board will be where one of the 'carved' support beams will be (containing the 'animatronic' singing Tiki faces mentioned earlier).

Haven't really gotten to the 'grand' entrance yet.

I'm trying to finish by November to host a party to celebrate the opening of my brother's movie (Madagascar 2). Tiki/jungle theme. I'll post again soon. Have a great weekend! Aloha and Mahalo my friends :)

Hoover Dam! You've certainly put a lot of work and thought into this, and it really shows. I can't wait to see it finished, it's going to be an awesome room. I'm particularly looking forward to seeing the completed booth area. I do like a nice booth!

Best of luck with the rest of the project,
J.

Thanks very much Junglero, you made my day. I know I'm no Bamboo Ben but when you share stuff, you kinda hope people notice. You are the only feedback/reply I've had in over three months. :)
I'll probably be posting more updated pics very soon (I've been busy working on it). Thanks again for the encouragement. I really appreciate it.
Aloha and Mahalo,
John

I love the two-tone bamboo, the map is VERY nice, and table. Mr. PuPu, the two-tone wall with the different diameters of bamboo look too nice to just be a home bar - way too nice, too professionally designed. This bar is gonna be something extra special.

On 2008-10-20 12:22, Mr. Pupu Pants wrote:
Thanks very much Junglero, you made my day. I know I'm no Bamboo Ben but when you share stuff, you kinda hope people notice. You are the only feedback/reply I've had in over three months. :)
I'll probably be posting more updated pics very soon (I've been busy working on it). Thanks again for the encouragement. I really appreciate it.
Aloha and Mahalo,
John

PuPu,

Your room rocks!

Some real love going into this project.

Beautiful work and some top notch craftsmanship PuPu!

Looks like fun!