To follow along with more participants in the Fall 2021 Challenge, take a visit to the ORC Blog.
With only one week to go in the One Room Challenge, we definitely had lot of small things to tackle this week. There aren’t a lot of progress shots because it was more styling and hanging things on walls, but I will go into a bit of why I chose what I did for this part of the project.
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As you can see, we tackled a lot relating to the practical flow of the laundry room this week, plus added a little bit of polish. You can also see that the cabinet doors are not yet on – and they likely won’t be for next week’s reveal either. We started out this week by sitting down to sand the wood filler that we had used in an attempt to make the doors more polished. Because of the inset detailing on the doors, and definite inexperience with the method of filling the grain, we just weren’t happy with the result we had. I think it really helped me realize the DIY parts of projects I do love tend to be the small touches and personalization, which there will be for sure in the final reveal. Other than that, I am most in love with the design process, and sourcing really unique elements that make the room come together. I’m glad we tried some more involved DIY for this project, but I am also glad I was able to do the introspection and really think about what I want to do more of going forward.
This picture might be of a tiny part of the room, but we managed to pack a ton of functionality in here! If you remember the earliest posts about this room, it had a drying rack that took up a ton of room and really didn’t work for how we use this space. We do a lot of home “dry cleaning” with Dryel (affiliate link), and those clothes need to hang up right after they come out of the Dryel bag to stay wrinkle-free. We also steam clothes and other items that remove wrinkles, way more frequently than we iron. That means this NEWRAIN folding clothes hanger rack (affiliate link) is a much better fit for this room, both in the space it takes up and the function it gives.
I took a ton of inspiration for this room’s function from this Apartment Therapy post, 16 Laundry Room Organization Ideas You Can Hack at Home. One of them was the idea to use a wall-mounted mailbox as a tiny garbage can to hold lint. This West Elm mailbox was just the right size, and it gives a little sleek style to a pretty practical task.I knew we had a lot of individual things to hang on the walls in here, but I didn’t want individual hooks to hold the broom, dustpan, and other things. Instead, for a more collected and cohesive look, we bought this Project 62 accordion rack from Target. With a little faux leather beading cord to make loops for hanging, we were able to keep these things out of the way but easy to grab.
The matte black metal trend continues here, with the finished edge of the counter. This piece of 3/4” outside corner molding from Home Depot was cut to fit and then glued in place with silicone. After using some clamps to hold it in place while it dried, we were good to go.We actually tried the trim going over the top corner and over the bottom corner, and we ended up going with the latter. When the trim was on top and on the front of the counter, it just was a slightly heavy look. This gives all the protection to the front edge, while staying a thin outline rather than a really thick one.
Here’s another nifty idea I got from the Apartment Therapy article about laundry room organization. The recommendation was to use shelf brackets to hold empty hangers, so they are close by when you need them for hanging up clothes from the dryer. I think there are a ton of cool brackets out there you could use if you tried this idea in your own laundry room. For ours, we picked simple 3” black iron brackets we found from MountainMetalsByBen, a shop on Etsy based in North Carolina. They arrived super quickly, and I love shopping with small local sellers whenever possible.
This room is not only using matte black metal finishes, though! Pulling from the light fixture that is the inspiration for this whole room, we also have touches of brass. We swapped out the switchplate for the very clean brass Fenton Single Toggle Switchplate from Rejuvenation. I also found a little dish for collecting loose change and other things found in pockets on PeggyPotsPlus’s shop on Etsy, to continue pulling that color through. Finally, once the cabinet doors are installed, we will have brass handles on those as well, and I think those elements all together will mesh well with all the matte black metal.
The Jeweled Nest 