Part of my garage was going to be below grade so to make things easy, we did the whole 1st floor block. Now I'm really regretting it due to high heating and cooling costs. My original plans were to stucco the outside of the block. It looks like 10 times the work and a lot more money to put 1/2" or 3/4" foam panels, then wire lath, then stucco. Besides the obvious I'd have to tear out and redo 3 windows, one door, and do something up top were the stucco would now meet the vinyl soffit to allow room for the foam panels. I know the foam panels aren't the best insulation, but it would triple or quadruple the current r-value of 8" block (about 1.11 r-value).
My other choices of course include framing and insulation the inside of the block walls. Or maybe the foam panels outside with something else besides stucco covering it? I suppose it doesn't have to look as nice as I had hoped since only the front with 2 garage doors will really show. With the garage doors covering most of the square footage of the front wall, I could still just stucco that part right over the block. What about not framing out the inside, gluing 1" foam on the inside and cover it with drywall. But screwing drywall to block doesn't sound like fun? What if the drywall was glued onto the foam panels which is also glued to the block, and just had a few screws to hold until the glue set up. I'm picturing blue screws with fender washers, not a pretty sight, but it is just a garage/workshop.
Open to all... well, MOST suggestions.