Before and After Laundry Room Makeover

Doing laundry is awful. But doing it in a room that makes you sad is even worse.

When we had to get a new washer and dryer recently I decided it was time to get a new laundry room, too.

I mean, have you ever seen a sadder laundry room?

STEP 1

Undo the ugliness.

For me that meant removing all the junk, shelves, and old cabinets.

STEP 2

Fix the walls!

I've always wanted to try wallpaper but I've never felt confident in it. It seems hard (spoiler alert, it is) but our laundry room is so tiny it seemed like a good space to try to something new!

I got this peel and stick wallpaper from Amazon and it wasn't that hard to use. It sticks to the wall really well and hasn't fallen down yet! l watched a number of YouTube videos with tips on putting up wallpaper that were really helpful, as well. So the actual attaching the wallpaper to the wall part wasn't hard.

But what WAS hard was matching this pattern. I will never do such a specific patterned wallpaper again. It was a nightmare. I even tried to do a time-lapse video but it took so long to match up the video is just of me doing one small part. But it's here for your enjoyment anyway.

The finished wallpaper! The blue tape bits are where I marked the studs (for shelf hanging).

STEP 3

Shelves!

I really love the look of the industrial pipe open shelving, so I found these pipe shelf brackets on Amazon and just got some pieces of 1x12 wood from Home Depot to use as shelves!

These pipe brackets were really easy to install. Just find the stud and screw in the flange (which is apparently what this donut-shaped piece of metal is called- who knew!?) and then you just screw in the pipe part, then screw on the end cap. Super simple.

The hardest part is making sure they're all level so your shelf doesn't tilt.

I laid the wood on top of the brackets and voila! Shelves!

STEP 4

Finishing touches.

I really wanted somewhere to hang wet things I didn't want to put in the dryer, so I added a little hanging rack on the side wall. I used the same shelf brackets but picked up a 90º pipe elbow from Home Depot so it could come out from the left wall and attach to the back wall like the rest of the brackets. I also got a pipe connector so I could attach two of my 12 inch brackets to make a longer hanging rod.

I hated that you could see the hoses and everything right behind the washer, so I built a little box to fit around them and hide them a bit.

I got some fun copper baskets from At Home and organized all our laundry things in them. Things feel so much more organized when they have their own basket for some reason.

That's it! A before and after laundry room makeover. It is SO much more fun to do laundry now! It almost makes me want to put fun wallpaper in every room of my house. Almost...

This project's imperfections: Choosing a wallpaper with a specific pattern was mistake #1. Such an awful idea. If you look closely you'll be able to tell where it doesn't match up super well. I also had a difficult time making the shelf brackets level and had to re-do them a few times, but I think we finally got it right!

#diy #diyblog #beforeandafter #laundryroom #laundryroommakeover #makeover #industrial #openshelving #farmhouse