When I found this fabric, I knew it was TIME!!! I would finally re-do our pitiful little laundry room. It's called "Turkish Toile" and it's part of the Colonial Williamsburg collection. I had to work to find a way to introduce any fabric into this room, but you'll see how I did.
Then, as things sometimes happen, I found this Quimper plate the very next day. I loved how it had that orange color, too. You see, I've been dying to do an orange room and none of my design clients will listen to me!!! No takers!!! So.....I decided to please myself in my very own home and finally, finally, finally freshen up the laundry room.......in ORANGE!
Here's the way it looked before. Saaaaaaad, isn't it? It was a high gloss, blood red color with so many nail and screw holes that had never been filled and woefully inadequate storage. Just this small cupboard above the washer. This is really more of a laundry closet than a laundry room The reason I never re-did this room is because the previous owners left their washer and dryer, so we sold ours with our old house. (Now that house had a real laundry room.) This set seemed to be inferior quality and I never expected it to last more than a couple of weeks. I figured that I'd re-do this room when they were replaced. Fast forward six years and they're still going strong. So I'm probably jinxing myself, but I decided to refresh things.
Here's the way it looks now. Mr. Pressed Pants went away for a weekend, and I got busy! The color is Behr's Ultra in Marmalade Glaze from Lowe's. It's just called that. It's a paint, not a glaze. It covered that awful red from the previous owner beautifully. I built three shelves beside the cupboards which doubled my storage space. Two of the shelves have wire baskets from Ikea with muslin liners and the third is curtained with the toile fabric. I told you I would find a way! I toyed with buying a snazzy ironing board cover for pattern, but I really like a plain muslin one. Just me.
There is another shelf behind this, without pretty baskets. I just gathered the fabric on a tension rod and placed it closely under the shelf trim. Man, this color is bad. Refer to the first photo in this post for the accurate color.
Then I added a short closet rod for our hangers. I'm pretending here,that I only use matching velvet hangers! In reality, I like to stick with these, but Mr. Pressed Pants really likes his stuff on wire hangers. I know. That's weird. But, hey, I like to make the man happy, so I have wire hangers, too, and some plastic tubular ones. But, for the sake of this post, I'm coordinated, right?
The hardwood floors and the fluorescent light fixture stayed. I was able to get rid of that thin rolling shelving unit and chose a muslin lined zinc style waste basket that could go in it's place. Much better!
This photo gives you a better idea of the way the color looks. It's a really relaxing orange, almost a bittersweet. I remembered that I had these old, old handmade wooden clothes pins. Aren't they neat? They made the plate look a little less lonely and random.
Working around the light switch (sigh) I changed up the frame for the cork board and the little wooden sewing cabinet. This just contains a few spools of the most common thread and some buttons, etc, for when I need to do a quick mending job. (I have a sewing room downstairs that I'll show you someday.) I just went to check to see if this little cabinet is really this crooked, but it is just the photo.
I think I've done about as much as I can do to this room. When we first moved in, I toyed with taking room from the garage and enlarging this, but I'm glad we didn't. It's so small that it forces me to get all of my laundry done at once, since there's no way to hide things mid-job. Oh well, there's just the two of us here, and I'm not doing all that much laundry, so I'll keep on keeping on.
Have you ever waited six years to re-do the last room?
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