I am so excited to start posting ‘after’ photos here again! The house tour was fun and all, but I could really use some pretty in my life again. :)
I teamed up with The Home Depot, Maytag and Tide to celebrate a summer promotion where if before August 2 you buy a select Maytag washer and a 150 oz bottle of Tide, you’ll get a $100 Mastercard gift card. My part of the celebration is sharing my laundry room redo along with my best tips on renovating a laundry room on a budget. The extra exciting part is The Home Depot, Maytag and Tide are giving away a Maytag washer and dryer and year’s supply of Tide HD that comes with a laundry room design plan courtesy of yours truly, AND, wait for it… $5,000 to do it with! So fun, right?
But first, I want to show you what Michael and I were able to do on a tight budget in our sad, green checkered laundry room.
I was tempted to start from scratch in here. But when it was time to figure out a budget for this room redo we were also picking out floor$ and front door$, so I was like, yeah… you know what, we’re going to just paint everything in here and see what happens. :)
The walls were painted Benjamin Moore’s Cashmere Gray (one of my favorites – it’s a soft green-blue gray) and the floors were painted two and three shades darker on the same card. I think keeping the paint colors in the same color family helped the floors to not look so crazytown. I used water-based alkyd paint on the floors which holds up as well as oil-based paint, but dries lightyears faster and is a breeze to clean in comparison.
Other things that were painted in the room besides the walls and floors? The ceiling fan (just white spray paint!), the cabinets (Ben Moore’s White Dove in semi gloss), the mis-matched new hardware (three cheers for gold spray paint!), the IKEA woven baskets (spray painted tomato red!) and the new light fixture above the window (made the green line on the globes with green nail polish!).
We purchased a few new things for the room to make it more functional. I found the pull-out spray faucet for a great price on eBay and let me tell you – it is changing my life to have a deep utility sink and a really amazing faucet in my laundry room! :)
The sad before:
There wasn’t really a space to add a hanging bar in here, and seriously who doesn’t love a rolling laundry cart? So when I stumbled across this laundry butler online that was exactly counter depth, it was a no-brainer purchase.
You can see here above how we opted to take off the doors on part of the upper cabinets. Here’s what the uppers looked like before:
My sweet and totally ripped sister, Ali, basically karate chopped her way through the bottom shelf so we could get it out of the cabinet frame. True sisterly love right there.
Once the doors were off and the bottom shelf was out, we could fill the holes and sand the imperfections and then touch up the paint. I discovered my new favorite putty/patching compound
We added a little furring strip to the bottom of the cabinet and to the fronts of the top shelf to finish off the edges. This helped the shelf look SO much better.
We also painted the backs of the shelf the color of the wall. I think between that and the addition of the furring strips, the cabinet started to look like a wall shelf instead of uppers without their doors.
We added a furring strip to the bottom of the upper cabinets on the other side of the room too, just to help finish those off as well. I wish we could have replace those doors so much, but I think the white paint helps clean them up a lot and they’re not so, so country now. Compromises for the budget! :)
In the upper cabinets above the appliances, I modpodged the backs with neon gift wrap from Homegoods (the best place to buy wrapping paper IMHO).
I also added cork tiles to the insides of the doors for pinning up little reminders and momentos that make me smile while I’m reaching for the detergent.
I needed some cheap wall art in the room so I did my $4 print trick using a quirky image I found online of Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire.
I also made a sunburst-esque mirror out of laundry clips from IKEA that I thought turned out pretty cute. The arc lamp is from Homegoods. I found that little chair at Goodwill for $15 and reupholstered it in some Dwell Studio fabric from Home Fabrics in Mesa that was about $7/yd. Love that store so much.
I think my favorite project in the room has to be the new countertops though. We used a concrete product called Ardex Feather Finish to resurface the old laminate. I’m excited to share the tutorial!
The concrete made the room feel instantly more modern.
I think I read through this post like 5 times each time just in awe! Its absolutely incredible!!!
this may be a dumb question, but did you remove the green checkerboard wallpaper first or did you just paint over it?
looks amazing!!!
That floor is awesome! And what a clever solution to the countertop problem. Such a pretty space.
Your update looks so awesome! This gives me so much hope for my own sad, sad laundry room. I know you'll be doing a post for resurfacing the laminate counters but I just can't wait to ask. Do you think something like this will hold up in a kitchen??? This may work well for my "Lipstick On A Pig" budget I've got going on in my home. Great job, Jenny!
LOVE it! Can you tell me what brand of gold spray paint you use? It looks amazing!
What a fantastic transformation! Love what you have done with the counters and the open cabinets. So fantastic!!
You did an AMAZING job!!!
Holy crap, it's all so amazing. I love that you did this on a budget since my husband and I have a lot of upgrades we'd love to make on our new house, but we've run out of dollahs to spend.
What a transformation!I love your neutral with pops of tomato red accents. Beautiful, as always!
jenny , its beautiful , I dislike doing laundry , but would love to spend my time in there and surely will enjoy doing laundry. A question about the lamp … have you purchased it in homegoods recently ? I have been searching high and low for something like it.
I am blown away by how you treated the brick. Really really smart. The floors are the superstar of the room.
wow!! this is a wow makeover. beautiful room, well done!
looking very forward to the countertop tutorial. One question, did you paint the wallpaper?
Londen
Too Gorgeous! Do you have a breakdown of how much you spent?
AHmazing! I've always rolled my eyes at laundry room re-dos but this is SUCH a transformation from bad to good! It is totally merited.
I really hope that you post a tutorial on painting the floor. I have ceramic tiles in my kitchen and living room (beautiful wood floors in the rest of the house) and I have no budget to replace them. I'd be satisfied with a black and white check design, but I haven't been able to find any information on painting floor tiles.
Oozing inspiration! We just bought our first house (which is turning into more of a fixer upper than we thought it would be!) and our laundry "station" is a sad little corner of our filthy garage. It needs 911 design help, thanks for motivating me!
LOVE IT ALL! You are amazing! I am so excited to see the countertops tutorial. I would love to do this in my kitchen until I find what I really want.
Yes yes yes please! Love the redo!
So in love with that little lamp! The hunt is on!!!!
I am sure you will cover this in your tutorials, but did you paint over the wallpaper? The room is amazing!
Amazing job!!!
Hi jenny,
I am really impressed with your transformation. Remarkable, k
I love, love, love this room. You did an amazing job!
Amazing!!! It looks incredible! Where did you find the gold hardware???
I can't even believe those countertops aren't new. Can't wait for the tutorial!!
jenny, you are too much. this house is going to be AMAZING…and on a budget. bonus!
I am just amazed!!! I love your style , your new house is coming together beautifully. Thanks for sharing.
Amazing job on your laundry room! Wow, such a huge difference you've made with all the updates!
Whitney
http://www.whitneyjdecor.com
I too am excited to see the countertop tutorial! I will be interested to hear if it is something that could be done in the kitchen. We are hoping to sell our house and we are already losing money on it, so anything that can modernize on the cheap is especially appealing to me!!
My jaw dropped when I saw the before and after. You did an amazing job! I now want to paint my bedroom that wall color.
That is wonderful! What a change. I love the mirror.
A. MA. ZING.
Painting the brick floors was a stroke of genius! I also love the red baskets!
You did SO well. Especially on a small budget and in so little time!
You're awesome, Jenny!
Annie XO
omg, you are ridiculous! How do you come up with these ideas!! Such a transformation…
Wow! What a transformation! Please say this isn't real time!?! How can someone get ssssoooo much done so quickly? Super in awe!
Jenny, I have been looking forward to this all week, and as expected you did not disappoint! You killed it! Awesome, awesome job. So inspiring for those of us on a budget! Can't wait to see what you do with the rest of the place.
Such a great use of paint!! Stunning! Looking forward to seeing the counter top tutorial!
I am speechless…WOW.
This is unbelievable. My jaw dropped. The floor paint pattern is inspired. When on earth have you had time to do all this?! There are a ton of projects in this room! Love it!
Get out of town. Not only am I loving your laundry room (it makes me actually want to do laundry), but I was just looking at a new washer and dryer since we bought ours right after we got married. They are a-shakin' and a-creakin'.
Go Mesa Fabrics. (and btw, I can't wait to see what you do with easy access to SAS and all that vintage trim!)
I'm in shock! What an amazing before and after. You are Wonder Woman Jenny! Such a talent…
Jenny you are simply amazing. Can't believe what a total transformation you made. Cant wait to see the rest of the house.
I love how light and bright it is. Beautiful.
This looks fabulous. You are totally inspiring me to make some small but significant changes in my laundry room–starting with a board across my washer and dryer as a placeholder for the folding station I want eventually!
I really wont to try the arced feather finish concrete product and look forward to the tutorial. Very smart idea on the corkboard and clothespin. I have a 1980 washer/ dryer and that Maytag well I can only say much deserved. I have an 1960 bradybunch house bought 2 years ago and I follow your blog. Homegoods paper is nice. amazing ideas! Congrats on the baby! Many blessings
I love how light and bright it is. Beautiful.
I really wont to try the arced feather finish concrete product and look forward to the tutorial. Very smart idea on the corkboard and clothespin. I have a 1980 washer/ dryer and that Maytag well I can only say much deserved. I have an 1960 bradybunch house bought 2 years ago and I follow your blog. Homegoods paper is nice. amazing ideas! Congrats on the baby! Many blessings
I am speechless. Your floors blow me away! But the more I look, the harder it is to decide my favorite part. It is all so beautiful!
I can't believe it is the same room — great work!
Everything is so awesome, Jenny! Can't wait to tackle my own laundry room when we close on our first house in August :)
LOVE the whole room, the floors and counter tops are amazing!
Very beautiful update! I know I'm going to get flack for this, but that print is a Philippe Halsman. I'm surprised Kinko's would print something for you that's copyrighted.
what you did with the tile floor surprised me the most! A really great solution and you won't feel guilty ripping it out in the future if you ever change your mind.