Our 3-day Laundry Room Reno, Day 1

And so it begins. The 12-year-old LG front-loading washer sang its swan song this week, triggering a series of events that will culminate in a stacked washer/dryer. The goal is increased accessibility to the appliances and a little vintage storage in this tiny laundry room.

​Here are the gory "before" photos of the hot mess....because we believe in keeping it real. 

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It's hard to imagine how ridiculously small this laundry room is. And even worse, it's in a 3000+ SF home built only a few years ago. A pox on the builder who scrimped on this space, and shame on the homebuyer who approved it. Here's an etch-a-sketch topdown view. 

Laundry room renovation topdown view of the "before" layout

With a mere 56" of depth, a 29" deep washer and dryer left barely 2 feet of walking space in front of the pair. The width isn't much better - standard washers and dryers are 27" wide each, leaving a mere 20" for the door to swing closed. So it didn't. - it remained open 99% of the time.

Morale of this story? If you're building or renovating a home, don't "short sheet" your laundry space. Along with the kitchen and bathroom, it's one of the hardest-working and most-used rooms in the house. Bumping out this space an extra foot booth ways would have resulted in a much more useful and flexible room. 

Since knocking out load-bearing walls isn't in our weekend plans, we're going to work within the footprint of the room. Stay tuned...the next phase will be easier on the eyes.

​We're glad you're following our journey - feel free to drop us a comment below!

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