Brantley Gilbert picked up a new hobby this year during quarantine amid the coronavirus pandemic. The country star used his extra time at home to renovate his garage into a decked-out man cave.
"Nine years ago, I didn't have the means to build something quite this size," Gilbert told People. "But when I got married and had kids I knew this was my home. It's been a long process and it's evolved a lot. I'm a little bit OCD, and I like to be very organized, so I really just wanted a place of my own where I knew where everything was and I'm out of my wife's hair."
The new space, named the "Dawg House" after Gilbert's favorite team, the Georgia Bulldogs, is a place where he and his friends can go to write and record music, throw parties, and relax after work.
"I thought the Dawg House was a cool name, but also some of the guys will say, 'Well, if you do screw up and get kicked out of the house for a minute…'" he joked. "In the South, we call that getting put in the dog house, so now there is an actual Dawg House where they can come stay."
Gilbert's wife, Amber, typically takes the lead when it comes to decorating the interior of their house. "It's all rustic and reclaimed wood, modern farmhouse or whatever," the country star said of his wife's interior design style. "And I like some of that stuff, but she has the house down there that she's turned into Southern Living magazine."
When it came time to decorate the Dawg House, Gilbert was sure to make it his own style. "Up here, it's biker, hot rod racing," he continued. "It's a man cave slash showroom slash anything you can think of."
Gilbert created the Dawg House with his friends in mind. He included bunk beds in the renovated project so that they can come and crash too.
"I drew this place out on little grid paper, and before I knew it, all the guys came down and they brought it to life with their spin on things," Gilbert said. "Looking up at everything, I remember who did the trim around the bathroom door, who helped hang up the entertainment system, and any time one of the guys comes over, if they see something that's not right, they go over to the tool cabinet and they fix it. It's an ongoing project, but I'm more proud of it than anything because it's something we built together."
Throughout the pandemic, it's been projects like these that have helped Gilbert through his boredom.
"I do think there were some good things in the beginning," he said. "I think a lot of people, me included, needed to slow down and be stuck for a minute. But I will admit that I'm still not one of those guys who has handled it well and taken it in stride. Since I was 15 or 16, I've been gone 3-4 days a week playing music, and when you take that out of the mix and all of a sudden, you're home and not leaving… it just threw a stick in my spokes."
He added, "But projects like these help a lot, and my kids are such special young'uns. I didn't get to do a whole lot of stuff with them for years, like trick or treating. So I'm getting a crash course now and I'm loving it."
See photos of Gilbert's new man cave here!
Photo: Getty Images