My mudroom isn't nearly as big as yours but here are things to think about:

1) Shoe cubbies- make sure your cubbies are big enough to hold your shoes. In our house, we have big feet and so I used adjustable bookshelves because cubbies were too small. Also, make sure you have enough room to store all of the shoes (and boots if you are in a boot climate) you want to to store. We use ours for sandals, gym shoes, boots and athletic shoes (football/baseball cleats/basketball high tops). At least 4 pairs of shoes per person, maybe more.

2) A bench is a great idea. Maybe you could make the bench deeper so that the coats could hang above it but someone could still sit on it and not feel attacked by coats.

3) Coat storage- we have a lot of coats, jackets and hoodies. We could use more room for them. I don't know where you live, but in Ohio, the temperature changes here at certain times of the year make you want to have a heavy coat, a lighter coat and a hoodie readily available. Multiply that by 4 people and a lot of hanging spots are needed. Plus, some of us have more than one coat per season :)

4) Gloves, hats, mittens, scarves- I use a large basket for those

5) Any dogs? You will want a place to store leashes, collars and leads. Also, we have towel storage for wet and muddy paws.

5) Will you store brooms, mops, vacuum cleaners here? Need a place for those.

Does the mudroom lead to the garage? Think about backpack, purse, key storage. I also have a divided drawer where my guys drop their wallets and car keys. Otherwise they end up on the kitchen counter.

All in all, if you analyze how you live now and how you want to improve things, you'll come up with lots of ideas which will lead you to the best plan for you.

I think I like the bench under the window instead of under possibly-wet coats.

It's hard to give you an opinion about the beverage fridge. It seems an odd place for it and it uses space that could be helpful for something else in a mud room...But you know how your family lives and what you need better than I do.

In setup #3, the bench and the coats will block access to the open shelves? Actually, the hanging coats seem to block the right end of the hutch unit no matter what you have there, and blocking the shelves is better than a door. All this is an issue IF you're doing a rod with hangers, as option 2 seems to indicate. If you're doing hooks on the wall, I suppose you could keep them far enough away.

We're adding a mudroom to our kitchen - about 6' deep and 12' wide. I didn't want to see the coats so the wall to the right (similar to yours) I'm adding modified Ikea tall cabinets so that they are 18" deep. This way I can have doors to close the clutter and each person will have double hooks on 3 sides and one on the top middle to hang coats on. We're going to install the cabinets about 18" off the ground so everyone will get a wheeled bin for their shoes underneath. Each person will get a basket for their gloves, scarves, etc. for above the cabinet. If thier shoe bin fills up - they need to take some out. If you want to hide the coat clutter you can do that and add a small bench under the window or on the wall with the glass storage. You could move wine and champagne glass storage above the radiator. Once they have a permanent home you could use it as a bookshelf for the desk area. Recycles can still be in the same location. I think a bev frig is a lot in this room.

Yea, I kind of knew the beverage fridge wasn't going to work.

Corgimum-my brother has a corgi that we are all completely in love with!!! He's the most wonderful dog I've ever met. We don't have dogs so no worries there. The mudroom leads to the patio and is used exclusively to enter and exit the house. It's great that we no longer come straight into the kitchen with all of our muck and junk. Thanks for the suggestions. It's helpful to know exactly what we need to plan storage for.

Rhome-I think you're right and the bench should go under the window. I'm dubious about whether shoes will ever make it under it into cubbies so I could remedy that by putting a basket under the coats for them. We are doing hooks so I think the tall open cabinet will work best to hold scarves, gloves etc.

Bostonpam-I think a closet would be wonderful. Unfortunately, I need the space to store other things so we'll be using hooks. Your plan sounds great though, especially the part about having to put shoes away when the basket gets too full! Right now the microwave is on a shelf above the radiator as well as the phone and a message center/dumping ground of sorts. I may move the micro to the hutch counter when this is done, though.

Thanks for the input. I'm getting a much clearer view of what I need to do here.

I like your Option #5 the best.

Our mudroom has been trial and error. Your plans remind me both of our old set up and our new (in progress) set up.

I had dh build cubbies into our mudroom about 5 years before our remodel. It looked a lot like your Option #2--only with a second tower to the right of the bench (and the bench was open underneath with the floor and a shelf for shoes). Like your drawing, we had a shelf high above the bench running between the 2 cubby towers. To dh's dismay (he put a lot of work into the set up) we ripped it all out during our remodel because it wasn't working for us. We salvaged the cubbies and put them in a couple of closets.

Our new mudroom also reminds me a bit of your plans. We put in 2 large pieces of cherry furniture---both are on legs with about 8" of clearance. We now put our shoes under both pieces. We have a coat closet but also have hooks over our radiator for our often-worn jackets. They dry quickly there and I love putting on a warm jacket when I drive my son to school in the morning.

One piece of furniture is a tall wide bureau with deep drawers for reusable shopping bags, hats & mittens, maps, flashlights, phone books, dog stuff. There are also 2 tall door areas where we keep returnable bottles/cans and stacked newspapers for recycling. On top we have a paper organizer cubby, paper shredder and an area for charging cell phones. Two wooden pockets are mounted to the wall (supposedly for mail but we haven't gotten into using them that way.)

The other piece is an armoire which has a deep drawer for extra hats and mittens and shelves on which we keep clothes pins, water bottles, binoculars, school backpack and snow pants.

Yet to come is a small bench under the window and next to the radiator with a flip up lid for a chute down to the basement for nonbreakable recyclables and burnables. In the meantime we have the armoire pulled out from the wall and recycling bins behind it. I use the top of the armoire for overflow kitchen storage---i.e a big stock pot and glass canisters for storing cookies and muffins when we have them.

We had our daughter's dorm fridge in the mudroom over the summer. It was a good place for it (but we won't have a place for it once we get the bench in.)

our mudroom is about this size but there are doors and a closet in different places. We have two ikea benches that have shoe cubbies in them - I recommend getting more shoe storage than you think you'll need. Our family of 5 keeps practically every pair of shoes we own in the mudroom. We have one of the benches under the hooks for coats, and you're right, we don't sit on that bench.

Here is a link that might be useful: Ikea bench

Zelmar, do you know what it was about your towers that didn't work? I love the chute to the basement under the bench! I wanted to do freestanding furniture too and found an amazing antique grain hutch that would have handled recyclables in the two big bins on the bottom perfectly with lots of storage on top but DH is insisting on built-ins.

November, I like the shoe storage in the Ikea bench. Makes them easy to find, too. Mine are forever complaining their shoes aren't in the basket because they can't be bothered to dig deeply enough!

Cheril27- we didn't always have a dog either... we fell in love with our neighbor's corgi and now we do.

awwwwwwwwwww!!!

Cheril27--all of the storage in our old mudroom was open--open cubbies, open shoe shelves, open shelf close to the ceiling, open shallow bookcase that served as a food pantry, coats on hooks. We're not neat enough or disciplined enough for it to work and it became a visual nightmare. Each person was supposed to have a cubby + extra cubbies for guests and other storage. The one size of the cubby wasn't versatile enough for our needs.

Now I want a corgi! That's one cute animal.

Thanks, Zelmar. I'm going to play around with options 1 and 5 and see what can get stored where. We're not too neat either and I can see how things could get out of control get in a room like this! I'm not expecting it to stay pristine, but I don't want to promote chaos either.

Narrowed it down to two possiblities.

Option 1 bench and hutch on opposite walls

pros: bench will be more accessible for sitting
balanced
more hook space (two rows are possible

cons: tight space in the middle (only 4 ft)

Option 2: bench adjacent to hutch

Pros: more open feel
more open storage

cons: shorter and less inviting bench
less space for hooks (only one row)

Option 1

Option 2

I just can't get a feel for whether option 1 will feel to tight. It's only 4' but then again, that's only on the ground. Higher up it's closer to 6" so it may be just fine. Does anyone have a space like this that can weigh in here and tell me how it feels? Thanks.

I think I prefer option 1, but where are the coat hooks going? On the empty wall between? If you aren't completely on top of things, either way you run the risk of that side of the room being messy (or maybe that's just my family). I think option 1 contains the shoes, boots, coats, dirt to one side and the paperwork or other things you plan on storing in the hutch to the other side. You are also able to utilize more of the storage space w/ option 1, rather than 2. Those corners get tricky. I believe GWer Marin has a great corner cabinet in her mudroom. With both options, I like that you have your desk away from that side of the room. I love my open, adjustable storage cubbies, but they are a visual disaster at most times (now included). It's with much trepidation that I'm posting these pictures because our mudroom is always a mess. And I hate to admit it, but it's usually much worse than this because most of my kids are currently at school (along w/ their backpacks, coats, hats, boots, snowpants, etc). We put in a deeper bench w/ hooks along the back so you can use it to sit on and use it for storage above and below. I have totes to store off season shoes and things in the back below the bench. Great for storage, plus it keeps the space where the kids can lose things smaller. I did get a bev. fridge in the space, but I've moved it around several times and still don't like where I have it. It will probably move out to the garage in the spring. Your room is looking great. You will love having that space.

Oh, look at that snow!!!!! Thanks for the pics, Crazyhorse. I wish I'd had a space like that when the girls were small. Instead, all of their stuff lived in the front hall. I do like some open storage. Maybe I'll move the microwave to the hutch and use the shelves over the radiator for baskets of scarves, gloves etc.

Off topic, how do you like your thermostat in there? Ours is in the living room and as a result, the kitchen and mudroom never get warm enough unless I'm cooking. I was thinking of moving it but was worried that the rest of the house would get cold when when we cooked.

Sorry to hijack the post!

Crazyhouse, could you give the dimensions of your open cubbies -- specifically how deep is the seating portion? And how wide is each individual cubbie? How deep are your partitions?

Thanks!!

To me it's option 2 that seems crowded, as all of your storage elements are crowded into the corner and overlapping. More chance for mess and confusion, I think. The bench on the side pushes the 'mud room' out into the walkway...The floorspace seems smaller. My only comparison with the 4 ft aisle is in my kitchen. You are trying to do a lot in the space and I think option 1 just gives you more. The bench is low and, as you say, above that, the space expands to 6' and has the window for more feeling of space besides.

Hi,
I agree with Rhome that option 2 seems more crowded and like option 1. I think the room will be great.
We also added a mudroom with our kitchen expansion. I had no idea what to put in it but recently bought a few things.
The desk matches our kitchen set (the mudroom is open to the kitchen). But, the other 2 pieces don't really match. They have proven to be very functional, though.
I sit on the bench to put my shoes on. I'm finding it pretty easy to drop my shoes in a bin when I get home at night.
We have our tankless hot water heater in the closet, where we also have our shredder, paper recycle bin,and wild duck food bin. (and some construction stuff not yet in the garage!)
My goal was to keep mail and magazines out of the kitchen. So far, it's working.
I really like having both the closet (behind closed doors) and the other pieces.
Hope these pictures help..

Cheri - Until this past year, we had all our things in the front hall too. The large mudroom is my favorite part of our new house (at least the mess is in one room and can be closed off from the rest of the house). What looks to be the a thermostat is actually the alarm system pad. Our therm is on the back wall of kitchen, so I can't help you out w/ any advice on that one. This setup works very well for us. I've planned to add more hooks to the sides, but just haven't gotten to it yet.

Shelly_k - The bench is almost 28" deep. That allows enough room for seating while the backpacks are there. The top/side sections are 12" deep. Each cubby is 3 ft 2" long - not what would have been ideal for us, but we only had 80" total to work with. We have 4 kids, so we wanted 4 cubbies, but doing so would have left us with less than 18" each (not enough width for most backpacks unless jammed in sideways). To maximize the space, we went with 2 cubbies up top (girls in one/boys in other) and each has their own storage space below the bench.

Thanks, everyone. I think you're right that option 1 is the best. I know I'm trying to cram a lot into a small space. A free standing bench with a shelf (like the Ikea one above) may make things feel more open. I could also shrink the hutch to 4 ft. and have it centered on the wall. Then the coats wouldn't in the way either. Again, thanks so much. I have a much clearer view of what to do now.