I will help teach you how to design a laundry room … and maybe enjoy doing laundry. 🙂
When we built our home 3 years ago, I wanted a laundry room that was very functional. It wasn’t the biggest space and was right off the garage (so you entered it when coming in from the garage) so it couldn’t be cluttered. It needed to be laid out just right to fit in everything I needed in a small space.
I also only do laundry once a week (we’re empty nesters – no kids with tons of laundry) so the laundry part was kind of minimal. We didn’t have a ton of storage in our house, so this space needed to play triple duty – laundry/mudroom/storage.
This is the laundry side. I really like front loading machines because they hold a lot of clothes and use less water, but they are low to the ground which is why companies make stands for them. But the stands aren’t super useful, and I wanted to be able to have the washer/dryer look built in. My husband made this “case” out of furniture grade plywood that we painted to match the cabinetry. I designed 3 spaces underneath to house the detergent, my laundry baskets, and other laundry supplies. This also allows a flat space on top to put anything I want. Usually, this space has returns I need to make, or gifts I need to bring someone, or things I don’t want to forget as I walk out the door.
In these baskets, I put plastic bins to hold detergent pods and the bins do two things. They keep the fabric bin sturdy and stiff so it’s easy to slide in and out, and it protects the fabric bin from any unexpected pod leaks. This makes it easy to access detergent, and anything that makes doing laundry easier, count me in!
I also had him leave a small space to the right of the unit for me to store my drying rack. This was a great idea because it didn’t take up much space and it slides in easily. I use this rack every time I do laundry. The tile floor goes under this built-in (we installed the flooring before the built-in was made).
I also really wanted a utility sink for various reasons. It’s good to handwash clothing, wash out brushes or anything messy I don’t want to put in my kitchen sink, and it’s right off the garage for any messes outside. We found a piece of live edge poplar wood for under $50 to make the counter and just put several coats of polyurethane to protect it. I love the wood look with the dark gray cabinet.
The cabinet is a standard sink cabinet from the same place we purchased our kitchen – Prime Cabinetry. It’s also the same color as our kitchen island which you can see here.
Above it I put metal restaurant shelving with glass canisters to hold various household items, like these great sponges you can wash and reuse. I like that there is open shelving rather than closed cabinets to make it feel more open.
On the other side of the room is this storage area. My hubs built this to my specifications. We lived here for several months before this was built so I had a good idea of what we needed when we finally got around to building it. I knew I wanted flexible storage so the shelves on the left are movable. I also needed a place for long handled cleaning mops/brooms and a place for my vacuum so that space was built accordingly. I have a cool little gadget to hold the handles of those items so they stand upright and behave. I’m sure you know what I mean when mop handles misbehave and fall all over the place. On the lower right is an HVAC return vent, so we needed to close that in and it’s unusable space. I think we hid it pretty well. Above that was a place for my cleaning bucket and other things I needed to store. It’s amazing how much stuff fits in this relatively small space.
Another thought behind the design of this area was what type of material and finish. We built it out of furniture grade plywood and wainscotting because MDF (the other option) would warp if it got wet. I also wanted to stain it rather than paint it for two reasons. I like adding wood to the room to warm it up (lots of gray so needed a warm counterpart), and I wanted it to be low maintenance. Painted shelves scratch, especially with baskets on them. This is a high use area that I just didn’t want to have to think about maintaining. The stain has held up beautifully – it looks as good as it did the first day.
We installed a tile floor that feels like a natural stone, so it has a lot of grit to it which is good if it gets wet. It also really never looks dirty … bonus! I have a mirror with hooks hanging by the door so I can check myself before I walk out, and I hang my purse on the hooks so that’s handy as I’m leaving the house.
Like my grandmother always said – “A place for everything and everything in its place!”
This space is organized, I can find what I need because it’s out in the open, and doing laundry isn’t so bad in a room that looks pretty!
If you want to see my video tour, take a look here: