How to Effectively Organize Your Laundry Closets & Cabinets

What does laundry day look like for you? For most people, it’s an overwhelming chore that’s made even more chaotic by laundry detergent spills, cluttered cleaning supplies, a lack of sorting and folding space, too many partner-less socks, and piles and piles of clothes. Because it’s a space that’s all about cleaning things, the tidiness and organization of the room itself are often overlooked.

What if we told you that we could transform your laundry room to make doing laundry easier and more enjoyable? All it takes is thoughtful planning and the proper storage solutions to create a laundry closet and cabinets that are well-organized and efficient. At Inspired Closets, we’re here to guide you through the process of organizing your laundry space, from understanding laundry needs to maintaining an efficient system.

Understanding Your Laundry Needs

Before you can implement custom laundry room organization, it’s essential to understand your laundry needs. When working with each client, our design experts walk through your existing laundry routine to determine which storage solutions and organization customizations will make this often dreaded chore so much easier for you to do.

Your designer will start the process by talking to you about the volume of laundry you handle and how often you wash it. Next, they’ll help you inventory the products and tools you commonly use in your routine. Finally, you’ll discuss any special requirements you may have, like delicate washes, stain treatments, or other specific washing needs.

Considering every detail of your current laundry process ensures our team creates custom laundry room solutions that not only meet your needs and give you enough space for the work you need to do but also that laundry becomes a simpler part of your week that you feel totally ready to tackle.

Starting With a Deep Clean

Before organizing laundry room cabinets or closets, we recommend doing a deep clean of the space. Start by emptying cabinets, closets, totes, and anywhere else you store things in your laundry room so you can see everything you have to work with. Take some time to sort through items to decide what you want or need to keep and what needs to be tossed. Finally, before putting anything away, wipe down or scrub all surfaces to ensure everything is clean and ready for the installation of your custom storage solutions and any further organization you wish to do.

Categorizing Laundry Essentials

Now that you have a clean slate, it’s time to categorize your laundry essentials. Gather your detergents, fabric softeners, laundry fresheners, and dryer sheets and place them in a designated area. This is something our designers can help you plan in advance, too. We love installing adjustable shelves to accommodate different bottle sizes. You may also want to include stain removers and other specialty products here to ensure they are easily accessible.

Next, get your laundry tools together, like your iron, ironing board, mesh bags for delicate items, and scrubbing brushes for deeper cleaning. Your designer will help you determine the most logical and easy-to-access place for items you use often so you can grab them as needed without any hassle.

Best Storage Solutions for Laundry Spaces

The next step is figuring out how to organize the laundry room to best meet your needs. Laundry room organization best practices can vary greatly from person to person, family to family, and home to home. Working with a design expert who has a wealth of knowledge in the space means you’re getting the best possible solutions for you, your routine, and your space.

Below are the different customizations, storage features, and organization methods our designers will consider or recommend to make your space work exactly how you need it to.

Maintenance and Upkeep

Organizing your laundry closet and cabinets isn’t a one-time task. While having custom storage solutions makes maintaining laundry room flow and organization so much easier, it’s helpful to establish a maintenance routine to keep your laundry room clean and efficient.

Regularly Checking Product

Regularly check your products to see if they’re close to being empty or expired. Make sure to toss things that are no longer good or containers without any product left so they aren’t cluttering your space.

Cleaning Periodically

It may sound simple, but because it’s not a room we have to look at every day or spend a lot of time in, people often neglect adding the laundry room to their regular cleaning schedule. Cleaning your laundry closets or cabinets periodically keeps the space fresh and organized. We recommend wiping down shelves and surfaces about once a month to prevent dust, dirt, and product buildup.

Updating the Storage System

Your laundry and storage needs may change over time, so it’s good to stay flexible with your system and be willing to update it as needed. Adjustable storage solutions, like the shelves mentioned above, are a great way to ensure you have a system that works for you now and can also easily be changed to suit your home’s needs in the future.

Enhancing Laundry Efficiency

The helpful tips above layout how to get your laundry room organized and keep it that way. Below are some final ideas from our design experts about how to improve overall laundry efficiency. Spoiler alert—there are a lot of customizations and features we can add to your space to help you get the job done!

1. Creating Dedicated Space for Pre-Treatment

Having a space just for pre-treating clothes and tackling stain removal makes it easier to catch any stains before they become permanent. We often add hooks or drying racks in this area to hang the products as they’re being worked on, as well as a place to organize and store scrubbing brushes, stain removers, and any other special products you like to use. If you have the space, a dedicated sink for pre-soaking tough stains helps keep all the laundry in one room.

2. Setting Up a Folding Station or an Ironing Corner

Creating a dedicated space to fold and iron laundry makes it so much easier to finish each step of the process. Plus, it’s a whole lot easier than trying to fold things on the living room couch or setting up an ironing board in your bedroom.

Adding a bank of custom cabinets for storage means you have a countertop in the laundry room creating an ideal place to fold. Allowing space for an ironing board in the laundry room simply keeps the task in a dedicated space. A tall custom cabinet in the laundry room is also a great place to store the ironing board. If space is an issue, we can add a fold-out ironing board to the laundry room because it doesn’t take up any additional space and can simply be pulled out and put back away whenever they’re needed.

3. Adding a Hanging Station

A built-in hanging station gives you plenty of room to hang clothes that need to be air-dried. This way, your laundry room floor isn’t crowded by the stand-alone drying racks you get at the store. Store-bought drying racks always seem to topple over at the least convenient times, too. A built-in drying rack can handle a lot of clothes, ensuring they stay clean and free of wrinkles.

4. Organizing a System for Lost-and-Found Items

You’re not alone in finding little trinkets in the washing machine that got left in someone’s pocket before you did the last load of laundry. Coins, tissue, lip balm… whether it’s something you need to hang onto or throw away, it’s helpful to keep a basket, bin, or trash can nearby to collect these items and prevent them from getting lost or cluttering the space.