This post contains affiliate links. I may receive a small commission for purchases made through these links at no extra cost to you. This doesn’t affect my recommendations; I only recommend products I truly love. Thanks for shopping these links to support the content I provide! xoxo Suzette

When we built our custom home, planning and organized laundry room was top priority. Today I’ll walk you through all the details I considered when planning our mudroom/laundry room.

An organized laundry room

When we were choosing a floorpan, having an combination laundry room / mudroom off the garage was a non-negotiable for me. Our previous home had no buffer; you entered directly into the living room from the garage.

The perpetual pile of backpacks, shoes, and “kid junk” drove me crazy.

I had to look at it while I drank my morning coffee, while I cooked dinner…. I just wanted a space where I could close the door and keep it out of sight!

Working with our home designer, we created an organized laundry room that included some must haves:

Folding counter
Utility sInk
Space for rolling laundry bins
Cleaning closet
Locker/mudroom space
BIG windows (lots of light)

The laundry room is adjacent to the main entry hallway. | Photo: Christa Tippmann

Later, I worked with our builder and cabinet makers to add in more details:

Recessed metal sports lockers
Shelves for charging station, pet Supplies, andrts + crafts
Tall upper cabinets for bulk storage
Hanging rod for drying clothes
Floating shelves to keep essentials at hand
Row of wall hooks to keep things off the tile
Moody blue-green paint to make it fun!

Every single inch of this space was planned with organization and efficiency in mind.

Let’s take a peek at some of the intentional details of our organized laundry room!

I prefer stacking washer/dryer units. My only regret? Not making room for two. | Photo: Christa Tippman

laundry Station

This is probably the hardest working little corner in our home.

Up until the end of our build, this was supposed to be a HUGE vintage concrete sink.

It looked cool, but I worried it was too big for the space. So I switched to plan B.

The garage leads directly into the laundry room/mudroom, which was a priority for me when looking at floorplans.

I had the cabinet maker reduce the depth of the cabinets (and we also had to shrink the depth fo the countertop) to a non-standard (and very shallow) 18″ to give me more standing room to work in in this corner.

This change allowed me to have more space to stand and fold, and it allows better access to the rolling laundry cart that tucks underneath the counter on the right.

I source all my canvas rolling bins from Steele Canvas.

Shop

The Post

Open shelves (instead of cabinets) allow me to sort laundry easily as I go. Clean laundry goes in the canvas floor bin and the black metal locker bins, where it remains hidden until I am ready to put it away (which is technically never).

I switched to a compact bar sink for filling the dog’s water and laundry tasks… although it is small it is plenty big for what I need!

Cleaning Closet

On the other side of the room, I have a small closet, which I dubbed “The Cleaning Closet”,

I think most people would have probably used this space as a coat closet, but I wanted it to function more as a broom closet.

I asked the builder to install shelves, rather than rods, in this closet. This gave me lots of hidden, easy to reach storage for frequently used things like:

beach towels
rags
trash bags
essential oils
batteries
tools

I left open floor space for bulky items that are hard to house including step-stools, dog food, and vacuums/mops.

Tip: If you’re updating electrical, have outlets installed high and low in a closet to charge cordless vacuums and robot vacuums!

There are hooks mounted on the side of the closet for hanging and bins/baskets keep the shelving organized.

On the back of the door, I mounted an Elfa Back-of-the-Door Pantry shelf to hold all of the random junk that I used to have shoved in drawers.

Now we can easily find spare keys, the lint roller, super glue, tools and flashlights.

Lockers + Drop Station

The third zone in our laundry room is our “Drop Zone”. My family is sporty and I love industrial looking design, so I ordered school gym lockers in place of cabinetry for our mudroom lockers.

We had them recessed into the wall and added some simple shelves for extra storage and display on the right side.

The bench on the bottom of the locker lifts up to reveal a ventilated footlocker. This comes in handy when company is coming and I need to hide all the shoes fast.

I just shove everything in that hidden compartment and – ta-da!- I magically have a clean room!

The lockers came with hooks on the back walls for bags. I also hang rubber s-hooks from the rods to hang backpacks, coats and sports equipment.

Lunchboxes go up top, and I rotate the basket contents seasonally – hats and gloves in the winter, sunscreen and toys in the summer.

Tip: At back-to-school time, buy a few magnetic locker accessories. The pencil cups and baskets are awesome for easy organizing anywhere you have metal! I stick one on the side of my washer/dryer set, on the front of the garage fridge, and in these lockers to store small things that otherwise get lost.

We’ve been living with our laundry room for almost two years now, and it is still surprisingly organized. It gets messy, of course. We have a constant pile up of shoes and there’s usually laundry out on the counter. But it’s doing what it was made to do! I have a place for pretty much everything and I love being able to open up the windows and soak up the sunlight while I fold laundry.

If you were planning a new laundry room or mudroom, what features would you prioritize? I’d love to hear in the comments!

Thanks for checking out my organized laundry room tour!

xoxo