Laundry Room Remodel - DIY Shelving + Tile

We are rolling right along on our laundry room remodel! Things started getting pretty a few weeks ago when the floor tile got installed!

Black and White Checked Flooring!!! I have long dreamed of a black and white checked floor. I just love the classic vibe. The tile came from The Tile Shop and was $3.50 a piece (each tile is 12"x12"). I went back and forth on the grout color, but decided on black and I'm so glad I did. Not only does it just "go away" which is what I had hoped for, but the black grout will be SO much more forgiving as this room gets used.

Like the Guest Bath Remodel, we decided to hire out the tile work for this space. This room will be a combination of hired out + DIY, but we have learned, for us hiring out the tile work is well worth the money. The guys got to our house around 10:00 a.m. and by 4:30 the existing tile was removed and the new tile was down AND grouted. The tile installer had to come back the next day to clean things up and re-install the shoe moulding, but 90% of the work was done in 6 1/2 hours. You just can't beat it!

Now, let's talk storage. A few weekends ago we DIY'ed ourselves some laundry room cabinets!

And by we, I of course mean, Croix and I helped, Lot supervised, but Brent was the man with the plan and all the skills (per usual ;)). I showed you all this sketch a few weeks ago....

And this is where we we ended up at the end of the first weekend!

We had a few issues to overcome to achieve our desired layout. First was the location of the dryer vent to the outside. We knew the base cabinet would need to be pulled forward to leave a void for the vent to run from the dryer to the outside of the house, but the location of the duct was an additional 6" off the back wall which caused depth issues for the base cabinet. You see, if we brought the base cabinets out to cover the vent, the base cabinets would be deeper than the washer and dryer cabinet surround. This wouldn't have been the end of the world, but it is always ideal for any cabinetry that will receive countertops to run into a cabinet or wall deeper than the countertop for a clean intersect. Luckily Brent was able to cut into the sheetrock and move the duct pipe back towards the wall a few inches allowing the base cabinet to be 24", pulled off the wall 7" to sit a few inches behind the washer and dryer surround. Brent also angled the corner of the base cabinet so as to allow the duct to connect easily.  Brent cut a hole in the side of the tall cabinet to pull the duct through.

The other issue was the plug for the dryer. The outlet was located above the base cabinets, but we knew we could use the hole cut in the side of the washer and dryer surround to pull the cord through. We even found an extra long cord on-line to ensure it would reach. The problem was that the outlet was falling above the height of the countertop. At first we thought about just boxing in around the outlet and creating a shelf, but then we realized we needed to be able to access the outlet so if we ever need to unplug the dryer or if we ever decided to replace it,  we could get to it easily. We pondered on a solution for awhile, when Brent came up with the idea to box around the outlet with a shelf/ledge, but a shelf/ledge on a hinge that could flip down for access. It's genius! He got it all constructed, but I don't have a picture yet.  We are working on the countertop material for the counter + this shelf/ledge area now, so I will show you more soon!

As for the color, Brent and I both liked the idea of green cabinetry against the black and white flooring. To figure out the exact shade of green we bought 3 different options - Boreal, Alpine Trail and Pine Mountain all by Behr and then tested them out on this new-to-me product - SureSwatch. Each packet comes with 3 sheets and you paint your color right on the film. Once dry you peel it off and stick it right on the wall.

This was super helpful in narrowing down the right choice. Right off the bat Alpine Trail was too dark. We went back and forth between the other 2 for a few days, watching how the colors looked at different times of day as the natural light changed. We really wanted the color to read as green, not a gray that had green undertones or a green that was so dark it could be black, and Boreal seemed to fit the bill best. So, we got the cabinets all primed and painted, working on the painting off and on all week after work last week.

We are VERY happy with the color. It's the perfect shade of green, happy and bright whilst still adding some drama against the black and white floor. We love it!

Once all the paint was dry it was time to get the washer and dryer all hooked up and in place. In order to stack the appliances we purchased a "stacking kit" on-line. It was really easy to install and we had the washer and dryer stacked, hooked up and slid into their new home in less than 20 minutes.

This new set up makes the room feel SO much bigger! We still have a ways to go but I'm so happy to have the washer and dryer up and running. I never thought I would be so thankful to be able to do laundry - ha!

All photos are my own. 

Laundry Room Remodel - Intro

I'm here today to introduce you to our first project of 2019 - THE LAUNDRY ROOM!!!

This is the first of two projects we have in the works over here on the home front and I'm SO EXCITED!!! If you remember, this laundry room was one of the rooms I was the most jazzed about when we moved in to this house. Our last house didn't have a real laundry room. Just a little pad in the basement for the washer and dryer. It was dark, damp, scary - not a happy place to spend a lot of time. But the laundry room in this house is conveniently located on the first floor, HAS A WINDOW, a laundry shoot and is a decent size, so I have been thankful for it everyday, despite it's blah appearance.

This room had a lot of potential but it also had some flaws from a layout perspective. There were 4 doors in this laundry room, 3 of which swung in at each other when opened. 

We removed the entry door and replaced it with an antique barn door we refurbished last year during our mudroom project. This definitely helped the situation, but the two doors covering the linen closet still made the space awkward. On top of the doors, this room (like the future home office space) had become a catchall.

In addition to the obvious, washer, dryer, hampers and sink this room housed a freezer a table saw, table saw stand, two vacuums, boxes of office supplies/documents that were never unpacked from our move (3 years ago...gasp!), cleaning supplies, beer making jars and buckets and other random odds and ends that I would just shove in there to get them out of my way in our main living area. It was a hot mess. Earlier this year we started talking through how and where to organize all of this stuff and decided everything currently in the laundry room would either be going to the linen towers in the guest bath (towels and sheets) a shed that we plan to build in the backyard (table saw, misc. tools, paint gun, etc.), the home office (giant box of files, paper and office supplies) or would be staying in the laundry room. Even with a lot of the items getting moved out of this space we still had a good deal we needed to store, so we decided the best plan of attack was to remove the french doors covering the linen closet and then build out the shelving inside. The closet came with two wire shelves, leaving a ton of wasted space.

Up until this point I had always housed my rolling laundry hamper in this closet, but in order to really optimize the storage this thing needed to go. That's when we decided we would stack our washer and dryer and then build out some shelving to the right of that to house laundry baskets. There will be a countertop on top of the shelving for me to use as a folding area and a hanging rod overhead attaching from the side of the washer and dryer surround and the wall.

The linen closet will get built-out with nothing but shelves all the way up. SO MUCH STORAGE!!! 

A few weeks ago the freezer died (with stuff inside - UGH!!) so he is gone now too. This side of the room is still somewhat of a question mark as we decide what type of sink to get and if we will go back in with another freezer, a second refrigerator or maybe nothing? Still some details to figure out, but TILE STARTED TODAY so we are rolling full steam ahead! Don't forget to follow along on instagram for all of the behind the scenes happenings between now and the next post!

All photos are my own.