Laundry Room Update: Airing Our Clean Laundry

Sometimes you give things a whirl and they just don't work out.  We have learned to appreciate that around here.  We try things, and if/when they don't go exactly as planned or are they don't work as effectively as they could, we revisit them.

Awhile back I had read a tip that using a towel bar in the laundry room is a great way to create a simple drying rack.  So, that is what we did.

I would drape a sweater or shirt over the double rod towel bar, and it worked great.... when I only washed one delicate thing.  That meant washing important pieces of clothing in shifts or laying things out over the washer, random furniture or even hanging them in the shower.  I also recently decided that I would rather hang my shirts to dry vs. popping them through the dryer since it avoids any shrinking and wrinkling that is typically caused by the dryer.  So, I started brainstorming ways to get a drying rack installed...

The way our laundry room is laid out, there is no room above the washer and dryer or utility sink for a drying area, so I knew it would have to be somewhere on the opposite wall.  It didn't take me long to realize that a simple shimmy of the linen cabinet to the left, and I would be able to place a bar between the cabinet and the wall.  Easy peasy!

But a single bar from the cabinet to the wall really wouldn't feel all that finished, so I decided to complicate the solution a smidge by adding a bridge and some molding over the top of the bar, so it felt like it was all intentional and "built in".

We started by moving the cabinet down where we wanted it, and installing a painted corbel {from Home Depot} to the side of the cabinet.  To do this, we just screwed through the inside of the cabinet directly into the solid wood corbel.

As you can see in the photo, we also began the installation of the rod that would span from the cabinet to the wall.  We went with an expandable closet rod from Home Depot.

We installed the second corbel by screwing directly through the corbel into the wall.

The point of the corbels was slightly decorative but mostly supportive.  However, only supportive of a small piece of melamine board, cut down to the span of the cabinet to the wall.

Since that looks completely unfinished and silly, B quickly popped up a couple pieces of crown molding to finish things up a bit!

Some painters caulk filled in all of the air nail holes, screw holes and molding joints, and the last step was to install the closet rod.

Now the linen cabinet appears to be a large built in laundry land cabinet.

A view of it all straight on:

Now I am not only able to air my clean laundry, I am also airing my dirty laundry to all of blog land.  Awesome.

Many fabulous things came from this project that I am pretty excited about:

• I have given myself plenty of room to air dry our clothing.
• Our guest bathroom has never had a towel bar, so now we can recycle the one from the laundry room to the guest bathroom.
• Our laundry room has a more polished and finished feeling.
• I got to purchase some of my favorite white wooden hangers from IKEA.  Something about wooden hangers really get my heart racing...  Am I airing too much?

The only real flaw with the whole setup is that there is a lot of white on white on white happening on that side of the room which is much different than the opposite side...

 
So I am challenging myself to solve that problem in the near future...

But for now, here is a side by side to better show where the cabinet landed:

I love when I can expand storage drying capacity, with a couple of simple steps and very little budget {we already had the melamine board and crown leftover from other projects, so it was just an investment of the corbels and closet bar}.

Don't you love how molding can instantly take a typical piece of furniture and give it such a finished and polished effect?  Anyone else doing quickie modifications that make a big impact and leave you with a dorky permagrin like mine?  Do tell!