Tips for Organizing Your Laundry Room

Doing laundry isn’t complex. It’s all about sorting, washing, drying, ironing, and folding. Aside from the last two, the rest shouldn’t take you much time. Yet if you don’t have a well-organized laundry room, you could spend more time in it than necessary. Continually searching for the right detergent or fabric softener, or wondering where to hang clothes that must air-dry, can lead to frustration.

Organization helps with peace of mind, and so does a clean, attractive space. Here are some ideas to help you organize your laundry room and even add a touch of artistry.

The Basics

• Washer and Dryer

  • To start with, what soft of washer and dryer do you have? If you haven’t bought them yet, consider getting ones that are both front-loading. This opens up a couple of possibilities. One is to stack them, making good use of vertical space. Another is to have them side-by side, and to use the tops of them for folding clothes.

• Shelves

  • Where you have your shelves will depend on the size of the room and the arrangement of the washer and dryer. For example, a small laundry room with stacked machines can have convenient shelving along the wall right beside them. You can have two tall shelving spaces at the bottom for your hampers, one for darks and the other for lights. At counter-level, keep your detergents and fabric softeners. On the shelf above that, but not above your shoulder level, you can keep your iron, clothespins, and other items you may use when doing laundry.

  • If your washer and dryer are side-by-side, install shelves above them and put like items together. This might mean detergents on the left and an iron, clothespins, and so on to the right, with your hampers on the floor.

  • Another nice option for smaller laundry rooms is an over-the-door rack on the inside of the door, perfect for detergent and softeners.

• Ironing Board

  • Avoid the mistake of storing your ironing board upright or in its side leaning against the wall. If you’ve ever done that, you know how easily they’ll slip. Instead, install two strong hooks into the wall. Place the front or back foot bar of your ironing board into the hooks to hang it.

  • Alternately, get a nice tabletop ironing board that you can use on your washer or dryer. You can also hang this sort of ironing board on a wall or put it on a shelf.

Enhancements

The items above may fill all your laundry needs. However, if your clothes-washing is a bit more complicated, here are some extras you might want in your laundry room.

• Hanging

  • Some clothing can go through the washer but will be damaged or ruined in the dryer. A wall mount drying rack can make it easy to get these clothes hung up right out of the washing machine. You may want to install such a rack in a room with good circulation so that the clothes will dry faster. If that doesn’t describe your laundry room, consider your living room.

  • When ironing in your laundry room, you may want to hang each piece of clothing as you finish it, particularly collared shirts, skirts, and slacks that belong on hangers. A strong drape rod can work well for this. After you finish ironing the clothes, you can then take them to the closets where they belong.

• Socks

  • We all know it. Socks come in pairs, but often end up as singletons. Keep clothespins in a box on a shelf. Whenever you put a pair of socks in a laundry hamper, first attach them with a clothespin.

  • What about when you find a mateless sock, either after folding laundry, or somewhere around your home? Keep a box, bin, or other container in your laundry room especially for these lonesome foot-coverings. You can even decorate and label it.

• Detergent

  • Detergent and liquid fabric softener can be a pain to pour. The containers are often heavy, making spills likely when you attempt to pour a measured amount. Consider using liquid dispensers with spigots instead. Fill each with the liquid detergent of your choice. When you need some for a load of laundry, depress the spigot and let the correct amount pour into the measuring cup.

We hope these ideas help you improve your laundry room, whether it’s large or small. It may not be the most frequented room in the house, but it can be just as nice as any other.