Kids’ room turned home pub! After their son moved out, Kari and Elina transformed the empty room into their dream hangout

“Right from the start, the idea was not to buy anything new for this room,” Kari and Elina Leppänen say of their home pub.

They moved the home theater up from the downstairs of the house, and found the armchairs at a flea market. An acquaintance of Kari’s collects bar items, so that’s where they got their glassware.

“The only new piece of furniture is the bar counter, and I built it myself,” Kari says.

Kari and Elina love hosting parties for their large circle of friends. “Sometimes we joke with our friends that Erika Vikman might as well be singing about our pub, when she sings about a place where all the misfits are welcome.”

Kari says:

“The name Pub Immu came from my old nickname. I’d always dreamed of having a home pub where I could host friends. The first time I saw this bedroom, I knew it would fit here. However, the timing was only right a few years later.

It turned out exactly the kind of friends’ hangout I had dreamed of. At Pub Immu, you can play music as loud as you like, sing karaoke, and chat. Lately, we’ve been into board games. Everyone spends so much time on their devices these days, and playing games is a great change of pace. We’re also a musical family, so there’s a bass and a guitar in the pub, among other instruments.

At first, when the excitement was fresh, we spent lots of time in the room. Because of pandemic restrictions, we rarely went to real bars, but we did invite small groups to our home pub. These days, we use it about once a month. Even though the space is small, we’ve fit as many as 32 people inside. The best pub atmosphere usually comes with a nice group of around eight people.

Our family has always joked that as soon as one of the kids mentioned moving out, I’d start measuring to see what I could do with that room. Even though it’s just a joke, the idea stands: we live our own lives and the kids live theirs out in the world. It wouldn’t make sense to keep three rooms empty.”

Kari built the bar counter himself, and it’s the only new piece of furniture in the space. His cousin made him the Pub Immu sign for his 50th birthday.

The wall of the home pub is covered with all kinds of coasters. Elina and Kari collect them, and their friends bring coasters from around the world, too.

Elina says:

“Ten years ago, my son began his military service and moved out on his own afterwards. My younger child took over his room, leaving the smaller bedroom empty. Around that time, Kari turned 50, and I arranged a pub-themed party for him, buying decorations with the future home pub in mind.

Otherwise, Pub Immu was Kari’s dream, so he chose most of the interior. The walls feature some of his favorite vinyl records from his youth. It’s not a man cave, because the idea is for both of us to enjoy it. We didn’t do much renovation at first, but a couple of years ago, we replaced the pastel wallpaper of the kids’ room with a brick-patterned one that I picked out.

The home pub has always been a place for us grownups. When my children still lived at home, we used it when they were at their father’s, for example. After they grew up, they got to start using it too. They’ve held, for example, a graduation party, a bachelor party, New Year’s celebrations, and a 30th birthday party there. They also like having a place for the after-party right at home.

We have enough room for guests to stay the night after celebrating. We bought our house 14 years ago for our large blended family. It’s now been about four years of just the two of us living here. We’ve repurposed every bedroom that’s freed up: in addition to the home pub, we’ve made a dressing room for me, a living room for the two of us, and a guest room.”