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Laundries are often the smallest rooms in the house, so make that space count with these easy-to-follow hacks.
For one reason or another, it’s easy to overlook the laundry when renovating. As carpenter and builder, Dean Ipaviz, points out, “With a lot of renovations, the laundry tends to make its way to the bottom of the basket”.
Given how frequently the laundry is used, and considering many modern laundries are located within the kitchen or bathroom, it makes sense to give this room some love. Here’s how to do it.
The lay of the laundry
The first step in working out your layout is to consider your major appliances; will you get away with a washing machine only, or do you need a dryer too? Would an all-in-one washer and dryer be an option? Do you want your machines side-by-side, or stacked on top of one another? Which will give you the most space?
It’s much nicer hiding away the washer and dryer behind closed doors.
When considering your overall layout, look at whether you can extend into neighbouring living zones. When done well, this can enhance the functionality of both rooms.
As Dean notes, “Maybe tile [a] splashback, put some shelving in to give you more storage”, or even add a sink just outside your laundry where it can be shared with your kitchen or bathroom.
Build in for fuss free ironing
A mountain of ironing is daunting enough without needing to play hide-and-seek with the ironing board, find a spare corner, then pack the whole show away again. A built-in ironing station (or even a wall mounted ironing board) makes life easier – simply fold down and fold away.
You can even take this a step further and create an ironing station in your laundry, where all your accessories (iron, lint brush, sprays, etc) are on-hand, and clothes can go straight from the dryer to be ironed and then put away.
Read more: DIY or don’t? What you should DIY during your reno
Smart storage
While you’re doing your ironing in your laundry, you may as well go a step further and store your towels and linen there, too. Especially when you’re able to integrate your laundry into your bathroom, this is the perfect place to store towels and bathmats.
Pullout laundry bins are a space-saving solution for clean and dirty clothes alike – just don’t get the two mixed up.
In your design, consider building in hanging rails. These can be a great out-of-the-way place to dry shirts; and everyone’s learned the hard way it’s so much easier to iron shirts that have gone straight from the washing machine to a coat hanger.
Smart shelving is a must when you’re working with limited space.
Shelving, shelving, shelving
Because you can never have too much storage, finish off your space-maximising laundry design with as much shelving as you can muster.
Think about what you need to store in your laundry, and measure your shelves so your laundry powder, fabric softener, mop and bucket, and that value pack of 30 toilet paper rolls all have a home.
Shelving can be enhanced further with pull out drawers, boxes and baskets, so everything is in its right place – check out standard sizes for storage boxes when spacing out your shelves.
Behind closed doors
Where possible, it’s a nice touch visually to hide the entire laundry away behind closed doors, with the added advantage of keeping things quiet when machines are running. Try incorporating a slider or folding door as a space efficient solution.
“With smart design, you can get storage to work for you, even in the smallest of spaces,” says Dean.
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