Pantry and Laundry Room Planning

If you have been keeping up with our Instagram stories you may have seen quick looks at some of the demo we are doing in our old laundry room. This space has been on the radar for the next remodel for about a year now, so we are so very happy to finally get started on it. The plan is to make this a Pantry and Laundry Room space with significant storage. This is one (if not the only) rooms with all historic bones left in the house, so I wanted to do a quick background before we talk about pantry layout was a quick background of this space.

The History

Hearing from neighbors and previous family members of our home, and peeling back some of the onion ourselves, we are putting together a little bit of the story of this space… The space use to be the kitchen in the original farmhouse in the late 1800’s. Fast forward 100 some years and it was converted a few times over to a very large laundry room. Remarkably, this room was one of the original exterior walls in the house, so we found old windows that were covered up when the room was turned to an interior room, but the old green siding that matched up to the siding we found on the front of the house when to added the French doors was still there. Some drilled holes where the sink was moved a few times over. I think the journey of peeling back the wallpaper to reveal different wallpaper was a fun way to see design unraveled from this room. It was a very fun space to bring to studs and talk through.

Wonderful Finds

The general idea is to cut this oversize, inefficient, laundry room in half, and stretch it out all the way to the stairwell that leads to our basement. This will set us up for a very beautiful main level master with a dream master bath we have always wished for. During the tear out process we found some very fun things. So there were a few layers of drop ceiling and ceiling tile covering up some beautiful old beadboard. There were a few holes, but we are thinking it can be pieced together and carried out throughout the entire space. Also, we found some beautiful wood floors onto of the subfloor, that we think we can bring back with minimal cost. With the first plan budgeted for tile flooring, this find was a great find. So this is what we are roughly thinking of the space.

The Vision

The vision of the design consists of Kitchen cabinet-like countertop with lower and upper cabinets to maximize kitchen storage. Here I plan on always leaving out on the counters, our standup mixer, air fryer, microwave, and a few other small appliances that we rather not clog up the countertops in the kitchen. That will be on the back wall of the space as you walk in from the “library.” When re-modeled our mudroom we took out some inefficient cabinets that were essentially the pantry for the entire home. So we are happy to bring back pantry storage, especially with a growing little man that eats up everything in sight.

The location

This is a pretty exact drawing of the layout of our house below and where the butler pantry falls within the house and you can also see how it falls compared to the kitchen:

Our planned layout

As you walk into the space, you’ll be looking at more traditionally size kitchen cabinets and countertops. The upper and lower cabinets will be storage for our larger kitchen items we don’t use everyday. The countertop will have those small kitchen appliances we use very often, microwave, air fryer, coffee maker and so on. We do plan on have a sink somewhere on the countertops to really allow for you do everything right form the butlers pantry.

We are also keeping a 2nd fridge in this space. We already have a second fridge for the bulkier items and anything that Smeg doesn’t need right away or can’t fit. Around the fridge, we plan on bringing together our pantry shelving with our upper and lower cabinets, built around the fridge to maximize storage. We will be housing the fridge and other kitchen appliances in here… this room will serve as a second kitchen to us basically among other things.

On the wall that is the backside of the built-ins in our “library.” We are doing a slightly shallower floor to ceiling pantry cabinets. I love the idea of glass cabinet doors to force me to stay organized and less cluttered, and I love the idea of being able to walk in and look without having to open every cupboard.

Lastly, for side of the space that will host our washer and dryer, as well as a tall utility cabinet for brooms, vacuums, and mops. We are thinking of having upper cabinets for storage for more cleaning and laundry product storage.

Why so much storage?

Since this is the literal center of the house, we are looking to put as much possible storage in this space (with hopes of keeping it organize). It will help clean up some of our clutter in our cabinets in our house. And I love how functional this space has to be at all times, motivating me to get my laundry folded and out of the laundry room as quick as possible, not allowing it to pile up like it has in the past.

Now this is all roughed in… as we continue to tear out we are noticing a few changes that may need to happen to accommodate other aspects of the home, but the general idea is the same & with each board that comes out or stud that gets put back in, we are seeing this vision come to life and we cannot wait to bring you along the transformation. As always we hope you find inspiration here on the blog, from full remodels to small decor changes or room layouts, it brings me so much joy to share this with you and you to share your spaces with me. Thank again for stopping by the blog today and every other day.

xx Liz Marie