"Small Laundry Rooms that Work"

"Small laundry rooms have a big job to do. A well–designed space with clever furniture choices and creative storage is the key to making it both efficient and clutter-free."





Okay, so this is on the "Big Ideas for Small Spaces" page at PotteryBarn.com. Um, hello. I don't have a teeny laundry room, but it can be a tight squeeze when there are six loads of laundry in the queue (on the floor) and we're trying to get out the door to the garage. So, I clicked on the link, thinking I would get some helpful hints on how to organize my laundry room, since the sink is always NOT full of babyclothes soaking, or dirty mop water, or some other item you might expect to find in a laundry room sink.

Instead, it's full of:
1. Pharoah costume, bagged up and ready to be returned to the person from whom we borrowed it for Jack's Egyptian Festival at school.
2. Tuff Stuff (carpet cleaner), since it belongs in the cabinet below the sink. Said cabinet is locked with a magnetic Tot-Lok for the protection of the children in our house who might like the taste of various cleaning products. However, when the "key" disappears from any other room in the house, I always snag the laundry room one since it doesn't see a lot of action. Also, John constantly has a pair of shoes in front of this cabinet. Usually it's flip-flops, but if I happen to get off my hiney and move those to the closet, he promptly replaces them with another pair. If you were to ask him, he would have no idea that he does this. It's just as if there's some primal need to put muddy shoes in front of that cabinet. So I really can't hold it against him.
3. Preschool artwork - currently a snowflake made of Honeycombs glued on a snowflake outline on blue paper. Really, most of the time I take these straight out to the trash, unless it's one we want to display in the game room. Why did this one happen to make it all the way into the house? I don't know. Perhaps said preschooler had her eye on me when exiting the car, and I couldn't make a beeline for the trashcan. (Don't get me wrong here - I love the preschool she goes to - and she has a blast and learns alot, but the sheer volume of papers and art projects in this house are mind-boggling, so we only save the very best!)
4. Hat from the Spanish TV station Jack's Cub Scout Den toured last weekend. It didn't even make it the additional four feet to the coat/hat/shoe closet.

So, Pottery Barn, if you are going to give me some tips on making the most of a small laundry space, can you please illustrate with a SMALL LAUNDRY SPACE??? Instead of a photo of a palacial laundry room with a built-in space for the washer/dryer? Seriously, if you have a space that is large enough to be making "clever furniture choices" about, then you do not have a small laundry space. By the way, dear readers, if you have a laundry room that looks like this one, raise your hand. Raise it high ... you should be proud.

"Small Laundry Rooms that Work".

Wait, do you hear that?

Yes.

It's the sound of me laughing hysterically.