Basement Ceiling Recommendations

Hi all.

We're more or less committed to demolishing our basement to reconfigure it into the 21st century.  One of the things that's going to be a huge mess and removing the old plaster and lath ceiling that's down there.  I want access to the floor joists and joist bays to continue our process of removing outdated electrical and plumbing.

I'm curious if anyone knows of a good ceiling material which would be relatively easy to remove and replace should we desire to get back into the joist bays to run new electrical etc.  The ceiling is already low so a dropped ceiling wouldn't be best.

Thoughts?


My Aunt had one that I thought was perfect for a basement.  It looked so much better than a dropped celling with those squares.  Her ceiling was 1" or so slats of raw wood diagonally set in squares.  It has been a few years since I have seen it but I think you could remove each square or remove bigger sections to see what was going on with the pipes it hid.  I have no pictures to show nor can I find examples on the internet.  They had a finished basement with drywall and carpet.  The ceiling looked rustic but her basement was warm and inviting.  If we ever replace our basement ceiling, I want one like it.  


We used a drop ceiling system that was hung right from the joists as opposed to a traditional drop, if you google the name should come up. We ordered online. 

And rather than use the traditional drop ceiling panels, I found a product manufactured by a company named CEILUME. They do a lot of commercial ceilings. It's a very lightweight panel that comes in different patterns, we chose two and used one as a border and one as the inside, they look like tin ceiling panels. 


Not home but I will post a pic when I am. But google the company name and they may actually have a pic. We chose black and it looks very cool. 


We removed a hardboard ceiling in our basement and did not replace it at all -- just had everything sprayed white. I think it looks great! There  appears to be so much more headroom now, as the underside of the floor is what 'reads' as the ceiling, even though the joists are lower. I was faintly worried about dust sifting thru the cracks, but it doesn't seem to happen. Our basement is not really finished living space -- just a work room, storage and laundry -- but this solution saved some money, allows access to the systems, and looks perfectly fine to us.


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