Our laundry room is small, in fact, it’s not really a room so much as a closet. It’s only 59″ wide x 55″ deep. There’s not room for a lot of extras, and every square inch of space needs to be utilized wisely. Today, I’m going to share how organizing a small laundry room can help make doing laundry more efficient and hopefully a little less of a chore!
*At the end of this post is a source list of items to organize a small laundry room.
We recently renovated our laundry room. It was a dull, boring room with the original builder’s paint from almost 20 years ago.
When our house was built, our builder installed one open shelf above the washer and dryer that we used for laundry detergent and other miscellaneous household items. Look at all of that wasted space above the shelf!
When we were planning the renovation of the laundry room, I knew that adding cabinets above the washer and dryer was a must. We ordered fairly inexpensive white laminate cabinets from the same kitchen store that we ordered our kitchen counter tops from.
The inside of the cabinets have several adjustable shelves.
I used to store our cleaning supplies and rags in our pantry, but now there’s plenty of room for the cleaning supplies, rags and laundry supplies.
Organizing A Small Laundry Room
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Here are some tips for organizing if you have a small laundry room too:
- Try to utilize all vertical space that you can. If you have a lot of wall space above your washer and dryer, try installing inexpensive cabinets that will give you a lot more storage. If you like open shelves instead, consider installing open shelves from the ceiling down. Use that vertical wall space! I haven’t used them myself, but I’ve heard good things about Elfa shelving units.
- Group similar items on the shelves. All of our laundry items are on the bottom cabinet shelf above the washing machine, except for dryer sheets which are above the dryer. The other items in the cabinets are grouped together too. All of our rags are together, and the same with the cleaning supplies.
- Group small items in baskets. I have a lot of rags in different sizes. (Tip: I take old bath towels and cut them up into small and medium sizes.) I roll them up and put them in white plastic baskets according to their size ( all small rags in one basket, etc.). That way I can grab a basket, and pull out one rag that’s the right size.
- If you’re short like me, it’s a great idea to have a small step stool in the laundry room for reaching the top shelves in the cabinets.
- Sort your clothes in another room. Preferably where your clothes hamper is. Because our laundry room is very small we don’t sort our clothes in the laundry room. We sort them in our bedroom, close to the closet where our hampers are. We only have one laundry basket, instead of one for whites, one for dark clothes, etc. We keep the laundry basket on the floor in front of the dryer. Once a load is dry, we put it in the laundry basket, fold the laundry then put it away.
- Use your washer and dryer as a folding counter. We don’t have enough room for a folding counter in our small laundry room, so we either fold laundry on top of the washer and dryer, or we fold the clothes in our bedroom on the bed – which is close to our closet.
- If you have the wall space, hang an iron and ironing board holder on one of the laundry room walls. If we wanted to, we do have room to hang the iron and ironing board on one of the walls, but I iron any clothes that need ironed in my sewing studio. So, we don’t store an iron and ironing board in our laundry room.
- If you have a small laundry room, try an over-the-door valet rod to hang wet clothes that you don’t want to hang in the dryer. You could also hang a pole suspended from the ceiling.
- We also added a shelf right above the washer and dryer. It’s both decorative and functional. I have laundry detergent in the glass canister, and more rags in the woven black basket.
Source List For Organizing A Small Laundry Room
I hope you’ve enjoyed these tips for organizing a small laundry room! Do you have a small laundry room? How have you organized it?
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I’m joining these parties!
debbie says
February 15, 2016 at 10:46 amI went to your laundry room reveal and was totally surprised to see that the small laundry room you were showing was actually in a closet? Wow. Excellent space utilization. I toy with cabinets above my laundry often. we have the boosters on the bottom and I set my soap and baskets on the top of the washer and dryer…I kind of like having a little space for decor but I see you even managed that as well….Bravo!
Jann says
February 15, 2016 at 10:48 amThanks Debbie! Yes, the laundry room is only 59″ wide x 55″ deep. A very small room or decent sized closet.
Liz says
February 16, 2016 at 8:23 amWow! I love the idea of grouping items in small baskets. My house is so small the laundry room and the bathroom are about one in the same! What great tips and ideas!
Jann says
February 17, 2016 at 5:57 amThanks Liz!
Kelli says
January 1, 2017 at 2:06 pmI love the paint color!!!
Jann says
January 2, 2017 at 7:07 amThanks Kelli!
Abby says
February 5, 2017 at 1:07 pmWhat is the name of the paint color you used?
Jann says
February 6, 2017 at 10:50 amAbby, the paint is Pittsburgh Paints color Fern Glow.
Donna Makowski says
April 18, 2017 at 1:03 pmLove your ideas! We are downsizing and my new laundry room will look just like your “before” pic……for now. I found the inspiration to add cabinets instead – how did you mount the shelf just above the washer and dryer?I love that idea too!
Jann says
April 18, 2017 at 3:07 pmDonna, if you go to the top of this post, there’s a link for my laundry room reveal. I show how I mounted the shelf in that post. Good luck with your project!
Lori says
July 18, 2017 at 2:19 pmWhat kind of shelf, where did you get it, and how did you install it? The hose connection on my washer would be in the way. Any ideas?
Jann says
July 20, 2017 at 5:43 pmLori, if you click on the link at the beginning of the post (laundry room), it will take you to our laundry room reveal post. I talk about the shelf in that post. You could use a board, I found a shelf at our local thrift store. I put up L brackets and then put velcro on bottom of the shelf and the top of L brackets. So we can take shelf off if we need to get back behind the appliances.
Jessica says
December 10, 2017 at 5:55 pmThis is so cute!! What is the depth of the shelf right above the washer dryer? Mine seems to have to be pretty short about 6-7 inches and not sure how to fit anything relevant on top. Thanks!!!
Jann says
December 10, 2017 at 6:41 pmThanks Jessica! My shelf is 7 1/4″ deep. You can see that you can fit a canister, baskets, etc. with that depth.
Whitney says
June 4, 2018 at 2:04 pmHi!
I apologize in advance if I missed this, but where did you get your cabinets?
Thanks!
Jann says
June 4, 2018 at 3:00 pmI ordered them from a kitchen cabinet place close by. Not a big box store.
Trish says
July 28, 2018 at 7:58 pmMy laundry room is just like this! How do I remove the shelving?
Jann says
July 29, 2018 at 7:19 pmTrish, I made my shelf to sit on L brackets. The L brackets and the bottom of the shelf are held together with velcro. When we need the shelf to come off we just unstick the velcro. Since I don’t know how your shelf is mounted to the wall, I’m afraid I can’t help.
maggie says
August 5, 2018 at 6:19 amDo you mind if I ask the information on the sizing (dimensions) of the cabinets? What was the name of your kitchen company for this purchase? I am going to surprise my sister to fix her laundry closet while she is at work-it is so unorganized, I ran into yours and was so excited that I may be able to help her organize hers. Your help would be greatly appreciated. Thank You
Jann says
August 6, 2018 at 10:40 amI bought the cabinets at a local store, not a box store. I would measure the laundry room, and take the measurements to the store to have them help you with sizes. Good luck!
Dannus says
August 31, 2018 at 5:13 pmWOW! Impressive. We have a small laundry room that is also a small closet. However…. we have the Dryer vent tubes that are very visible on the wall! How did you manage to get two cabinets and hide the dryer vent? In addition,,, we have no floor space . Wea Maynard hvea.n inch between the bifold doors that close the laundry room . Just a bitty bit of floor. I somwould appreciate your guidance. This is amazing! Congrats!
Jann says
September 2, 2018 at 9:33 amThanks! Our dryer vent is behind the dryer. It sounds like your laundry room is set up differently than mine. Could you put cabinets on the side walls, or just one cabinet above the washing machine to avoid the dryer vent? That would give you some storage space then.