My Laundry & Mudroom – Part 2

When designing our home, it made sense to use pocket doors in a few rooms. The laundry room was one. A door hanging into the hallway wouldn’t be ideal and if it went the other direction, it’d be blocking my access to the laundry chute. So, a pocket door it was.

A huge favorite feature in the room is the laundry chute, which connects from the boy’s bathroom upstairs. My brother and sister-in-law’s beautiful old home has an amazing multi-floor laundry chute system and I always admired it. Turns out adding a chute was really simple, as it was designed into the plans and I’m so glad it was something I made sure to have. Although laundry chutes are found in so many old homes, I’m really surprised it’s a feature that’s not more frequently added into new homes. For us, it’s simply an opening in the floor, to the laundry room below.

When I was thinking about counter material, I wanted something that was industrial, as I really liked the thought of mixing an industrial surface with the beauty of the wallpaper and softness of the beadboard tile. I went to a local metal fabricator to talk about options. There were many, and my favorite was galvanized steel. I really like that galvanized steel actually has an almost soft appearance, as opposed to something like stainless steel. The fabricator advised against using it, as they were concerned it may rust. With my experiences with all of the galvanized materials I’ve encountered on farms for many years now, I’ve not seen that, so I was willing to take a chance. It’s been wonderful and I don’t foresee any issues. The custom counters were extremely reasonable – coming in around $400.

I made sure to add in a nice big sink for soaking. I added in a spray nozzle, as it makes it so nice for cleaning out the sink.

I kept the cabinets and hardware consistent with what was used throughout the house, as I think it’s important to do, so the rooms don’t feel choppy. It’s one of those design elements that you don’t consciously think about when you are in a home, but affects the feel without you even knowing why.

A really convenient feature is the vacuum pan adjacent to the door. The boys track in so much dirt from the fields and I love being able to sweep it all right into the pan. To turn it on, I just click the little switch with my foot and it sucks up all the dirt. I think it’s magic.

I opted for white hex tile on the floors in this room, with a nice dark grout. Dark grout is key here. I love the old-fashioned look of it and how it helps to show each and every little hex, but it’s also really hard working. It scrubs right up.

The walls are covered in beautiful Dirk Ellliot Beadboard tile, baseboard trim and tile cap. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen mud splattered on the walls and it’s such a nice feeling to be able to just wipe it right off. Dirk designed the cap just for this room, as well as designed the tile layout. They now offer the tile cap for sale, in addition to all of their stunning tile, including the beadboard tile that was used throughout the room.

Although the tile is barely visible behind the washer and dryer, I still opted to have the tile fully installed there, all the way to the floor. Even though I only see brief glimpses of the tile behind there, it was a really nice way to finish off the room. It makes it feel complete. And although I opted for a dark grout on the floor, to call out each hex shape, I opted to keep the grout on the walls as close to the tile color as possible, so it sort of just whispers. It’s softer that way.

You can read the first part of my Laundry & Mud Room post here.