Renovation Reveal: Laundry and Entryway

Laundry Room

What is now our laundry room was basically wasted space when we bought the house. It was a 60-inch space between the house and garage with no obvious purpose. We always thought it would be the perfect place for laundry, but it dropped way down the priority list when we discovered that we had to renovate all three bathrooms. Anyway, this is what the space looked like when we started the laundry renovation. 

Before

After taking the room to the studs, reframing as needed, framing and installing a new interior door, framing and installing a proper fire-rated door to the garage, adding the necessary plumbing and electricity plus lights and fans, insulating, drywalling, painting, tiling, hanging cabinets, installing and painting trim, and moving the washer and dryer into place, this is what we have today. 

After (taken from the garage side)

After (taken from the house side)

Although we finished within budget even after greatly expanding the project (see below and here), we have opted to keep our current washer and dryer. Aside from the practical point that they are still highly functioning, I'm a bit nervous about replacing machines that I know and like with new ones at a time when I'm anticipating doing a lot of laundry.

Laundry Closet

When we moved into our house, the laundry was located in a closet just inside the entryway. It had doors, but the laundry couldn't actually be used with the doors in place. (This should have been our first red flag, but we were hopelessly optimistic first time homeowners.) Needless to say, the doors came off almost immediately. 

2007

Over time, I painted the area when I painted the hallway, and we hung a simple shelf and some dark curtains to keep the laundry (mostly) out of sight. Oh yeah, and I hung one of George's previously white socks that I accidentally dyed when I washed a load of laundry with a new, pink rug. Doh! 

This is what the laundry closet looked like when we started this project. 

Before

The result of the renovation is an empty closet with new 6-panel doors. We have some work to do inside the closet to get it ready to store the umpteen million things we want to store, but we'll get to that over the next few months. With the doors closed, it's a big improvement from our exposed washer/dryer or Ikea curtains, don't you think? 

After

Entryway

What does the entryway have to do with the laundry? Well, when you enter our front door, the old laundry closet is just to the right, and the new laundry room is directly to the left.

The new laundry room door automatically improved the entryway but left the [insert negative adjective] closet doors and flooring, which looked more like stickers than flooring, looking even worse. So, it made sense to carry the new tile into the entryway and replace the closet door with something nice and in keeping with the style of the new interior door while we were already making improvements. 

Here is what the transition between the entryway and the laundry room looked like before we started. Check out the shape of those doors! 

Before

And here is the transition from the entryway to the laundry room now. 

After

After

Remember, the old view from the entryway to the laundry closet? 

Before

This is the new view from the entryway to the (former laundry) closet. 

Here's the evolution of the rest of the entryway: 

2007

2008 - After a coat of paint

2010 - After a new, lighter paint and brand new door and trim

2012 - With the new tile

Because we were already replacing the doors on the entryway closet and old laundry closet, we decided to go ahead and replace the only other main floor closet door, which keeps our pantry neatly hidden away.

And now you see how I've reached peace with painting 6-panel doors. There are three coats on every new closet door and the new door to the laundry for a total of more mini-roller and brush strokes than I care to count. Phew!