Making Our Laundry Room More Functional

When you move into a new house, there are typically things that you want to change to look better and things you want to change to work better. While we I have plenty of things in the former category, this one falls almost entirely into the latter. 

Our laundry room is galley style. When we moved in, there were upper and lower cabinets on the left side behind the door, a counter running across the far wall of the room, and the washer and dryer with upper cabinets on the right side of the room. This before photo mercifully leaves out the cheesy "Laundry Room: Loads of Fun" wall decal above the window.  

BEFORE

After living here a little while, it became clear that we needed to make some changes in the laundry room. 

Even though I'd hoped to make the older washer and dryer work, I couldn't live with a washer that went out of balance multiple times on every load...and had a service record of doing it for years. I did some research and ordered some new machines, which we had installed in reverse for better flow of laundry from the washer to dryer. That was the expensive but relatively easy part. 

I grew up without a dryer, and I still air dry about a quarter of our laundry. As it was, the only place to hang wet clothes was a rack on the back of the door, which didn't allow for much space between items if more than four or five items were hanging at once. Meanwhile, the counter across the back made the room feel small without lending much utility. These problems and this pin got me thinking about putting in rod in the space to the left of the machines. 

AFTER

George graciously gave me a fair bit of his weekend time cutting out the back section of the counter, sanding down the new counter edge, and hanging the curtain rod that I picked out. I pulled out the previous owners' paint and touched up the walls and cabinet where the counter used to be. I was pleasantly surprised that the wall decal peeled right off with the help of my hairdryer. 

Now, the room feels a lot more spacious, we can more easily access the rear cabinet, and I have the vertical space I need for drying clothes and storing things like our step ladder and vacuum. While I was a bit concerned about losing half of the counter space, the remaining space has been plenty for my needs. Mission accomplished. 

How are you making your home work for you?