“My two favorite parts of the renovation were my laundry room and mudroom”

Esti:

Acouple of years ago, we extended our small house to accommodate our growing family. My two favorite parts of the renovation were my laundry room and mudroom. As I told that to a friend, I realized I must have reached adulthood without noticing! How else would two such unglamorous spaces be my favorites? The beauty of an organized and efficiently run household completely overshadowed the far prettier rooms in my updated house.

I don’t need to remind you that laundry is never-ending. Having a solid system that lends itself to a swift turnaround makes all the difference in the day-to-day running of a busy household. There are many companies that offer beautiful custom laundry room cabinetry, but so many of my clients, myself included, either don’t feel the need for that, or are working on tight budgets and want to maximize the efficiency of their laundry area without spending on that.

I used Ikea’s Boaxel System to customize my own laundry room and those of many clients. For others, like Yocheved, their available space needed something different to really fit in everything they wanted, so with a bit of creativity and some Amazon browsing, we created a setup that suited their needs.

FAVORITE PRODUCT
No, I don’t get a commission, but the reason you’ll see the Ikea Boaxel system in so many of my clients’ laundry areas is because it’s just so versatile and customizable. There are two widths and two heights, and you can use them in whichever configuration maximizes your space best. There are multiple rods, racks, shelves, and drawers to choose from. It’s so easy to adjust the spacing that you can change it daily depending on your needs.

UP IN THE AIR
I air-dry a ton of laundry each week so I wanted enough drying space to hang two large loads of delicates at once. Five of the wider (31.5”) Boaxel racks work perfectly for that. I use three of them for flat hanging, one for long hanging, and the last one with two racks for short hanging. (If you’re installing this as part of a new build or renovation, be sure to show your contractor the system and where you want it installed before they sheetrock so they can put sufficient blocking (wood) in the right spots for a more secure installation.)

UNEXPECTED BENEFIT
I decided not to get any of the official rods and use the drying racks even for hangers. It keeps things even more flexible when a load has more clothes that need flat hanging than clothing that dries on a hanger.

MOST ENJOYED ASPECT
I wanted each family member to have their own drawer for clean laundry. My cleaning help folds all the laundry once a week, on Wednesdays, but I wash multiple loads a day. As each load comes out of the dryer, I sort the clothing and throw each person’s clothes into their drawer. The same goes for air-dried laundry. This way, if a kid wants their favorite shirt that was already washed but not yet folded, they know they can find it in their drawer and they don’t need to sort through everyone’s things mixed in a full basket. On Wednesdays, I slip each drawer off its track and put it on that person’s bed. By the end of the day, each person has their folded laundry on their bed waiting patiently for them to put it away, and the baskets are back on their tracks in the laundry room.

HIDDEN SECRETS
There’s plenty of room under the racks to store my laundry baskets. It keeps them out of the way, yet at arm’s reach.

TINY DETAIL, BIG IMPACT
Running a dehumidifier in your laundry room will help your laundry dry within a few hours! If you get one with a drain pipe, you can have it drain directly into the washing machine drain and never have to empty the bucket. When there’s the space for it, I like to build a niche for the dehumidifier to stay in. You can also get a smaller one (though they’re often not as powerful) and keep it on a shelf.

BIGGEST REGRET
The white shelves were out of stock when I ordered my system, but it would have looked more cohesive than the wood ones. I should have waited a bit to see if they would restock them, because they did. Maybe one day I’ll switch them out.

Yocheved:

We decided to move our washing machine and dryer up to an empty closet on the landing of our stairs. Interestingly, the closet goes really high up because it’s only halfway up the stairs, but it stretches to the ceiling of the second floor. It even has a window. I asked Esti to come take a look at the space because there didn’t seem much to do with only a few extra inches on either side of the machines. She used that area on the side for deep shelves. She suggested using the height to our benefit and mount drying racks that can extend when needed but retract out of the way when not in use. We do a lot of ironing, so she suggested a mounted slide-out ironing board that extended over the dryer for quick and efficient ironing. We couldn’t believe how much we were able to get out of this closet!

MOST ENJOYED ASPECT
The convenience of everything in one spot. The shelving on the right side holds so much with easy-reach access. I can fold laundry on top of the machines and iron there, too. No need to schlep heavy, wet hanging elsewhere. For us, consolidating everything laundry-related was a game changer.

EXCEEDED YOUR EXPECTATIONS
The wall-mounted drying racks hold a lot of weight really well!

UNEXPECTED BENEFIT
We ended up with plenty of storage space on the shelves. I keep a folding step stool on the bottom so I can reach the drying racks more easily.

BIGGEST REGRET
Not doing it sooner! It wasn’t nearly as expensive as we had anticipated. We probably saved a bit because we tacked it onto another project we were doing with the contractor, but we could have and probably should have done it sooner.

We decided to move our washing machine and dryer up to an empty closet on the landing. We couldn’t believe how much we were able to get out of this closet

TINY DETAIL, BIG IMPACT
The ironing board is so convenient in how it extends for use and slides right back onto the shelf when we’re done.

LAST-MINUTE CHANGE
We were going to go with an electronic extendable drying rack for the left wall, but we ended up getting the cheaper manual one, and we’ve been really happy with it.

NEVER EVER
Bifold doors are annoying because they keep coming off the track. If you can avoid them and put in a different style door, I’d suggest you do that.

THIS IS WHAT I’D TELL SOMEONE ELSE DOING THIS
Go for it! It’s so practical and organized! There’s no constant back-and-forth for each step of the laundry process, saving you so much time and energy.

OOPS
Our contractor didn’t anchor the left drying rack to the wall well enough, and at one point, it disconnected due to the weight of the clothes. My husband reinstalled it properly and we haven’t had an issue since.

NOW I KNOW
We bought a washer/dryer set that could be stacked, but didn’t realize until all the plumbing was finished that the two doors would open back-to-back in the center. Had we realized, we could have installed them in the opposite spots or gotten different machines, but at that point, it was too late. It makes it a bit more annoying to transfer loads from the washing machine to the dryer, but it’s not the end of the world.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 932)