Melding Form + Function in Your Laundry Room

If you have to do it—

—you might as well do it in style. We’ll be the first to admit that laundry isn’t our favorite activity, but it’s an unavoidable part of life, and the majority of us spend hours a week washing, drying, and folding. The time of spring cleaning is upon us and sometimes creating an appealing, clutter-free, and organized space is all it takes to make an everyday chore feel a little less mundane. Crafting a beautiful laundry room is the perfect place to start, and over the years, Shea and the design team have taken on quite a few. While we all might not have four walls dedicated to the task of laundry, there are a few tips and tricks you can follow that will help streamline your washing routine, melding form and function in one of the most utilitarian spaces of a home.

When you go through the list of places you want to decorate in the home, the laundry room usually ends up on the back burner. Typically, it’s not a space that’s designed to be center stage. However, we like it as a place of refuge. Our tagline, Make Life Beautiful, translates into more than just pretty vignettes and styling, but also the most mundane, everyday moments. Scroll through the photo tours of some of Studio McGee’s past laundry room projects below to see for yourself and gather ideas about how to implement a few of these elements into your own home with our four crucial tips.

Tip No. 01 | Attractive Storage Solutions

Tip No. 02 | Quality Suds & Scents

Tip No. 03 | Greenery Goes a Long Way

Tip No. 04 | Elevate with Art

Tip No. 01 | Attractive Storage Solutions

Sometimes you want to hide your clutter, but in a laundry room, it’s the clutter you need the most accessible. Even in smaller spaces, we try to create a countertop surface for laundry rooms. You’ll need it to treat, sort, and fold clothes. One good go-to layout if your space permits is using a front-loading washer and dryer and adding a countertop over it. Wipeable counters and tiled backsplashes always make for easy clean up when dirty laundry is thrown in the room. Low-maintenance flooring is another area to consider—we want flooring that isn’t afraid to get wet. Warm up the space with an indoor/outdoor rug that you can simply hose off should it get dirty.

From there, layer in pretty storage solutions to display or corral cleaning products, linens, or other miscellaneous items. We love using a mix of boxes, baskets, and even glass jars to style in shelving or on the countertop. Not only do they bring texture and character into any space, but they will also quickly become home to stray socks and random pocket finds. Trays are a good way to group products together according to their function. For a more substantial laundry room storage idea, consider a rolling laundry bin. Even if you don’t have a designated under-the-counter space for something like this, you could still style one or two in any laundry room to add the option of wheeling your clean laundry to your closet.

And lastly, don’t forget hooks. You need a space for hanging your garments that don’t go in the dryer. A great place for this is beneath a cabinet or shelf, or on the backside of a door. An alternative option is hanging a foldable drying rack if you have wall space.

Tip No. 02 | Quality Suds & Scents

Enhance your laundry experience with pretty, sweet-smelling soaps, elevated laundry fragrances, and candles and scents to make the process a bit more enjoyable. Is there anything better than walking into a room and noticing the perfect amount of a fragrance that relaxes and soothes? We didn’t think so. Why skimp on that feeling when it comes to a space you spend a consider amount of your life in.

Our Pura x Studio McGee collection is tailor-made for a space like the laundry room. The plug-in device dispenses the scent of your choice according to how you program it in the downloaded app. Wild Sage would be a perfect pairing with its clean, crisp, and calming properties.

Tip No. 03 | Greenery Goes a Long Way

Although it might seem funny to add greenery in a laundry room, we love how a plant or two instantly brings life into utility-focused spaces like these. Whether you opt for real, faux, or a mix, you’ll be surprised at how much it can change the feeling of your space. Greenery—aka nature—is proven to reduce stress and soothe. It’s a no-brainer to add it to a space where the main function is getting a job done.

Tip No. 04 | Elevate with Art

We love the unexpected touch of artwork in the laundry room. Leaned up against the back of the countertop or styled in a built-in, artwork can elevate the laundry room like nothing else. As we’ve said before, don’t skimp on styling a space where you send so much of your time.

If only we can all do laundry by natural light! Unfortunately, the reality is that dream is usually not the case. We not only like to focus on good art in a laundry room, we love adding the perfect amount of lighting for functionality, but also as a beautiful focal point of the laundry room to take the design to the next level.