hi mara! Unfortunately, I think laundry in the basement is the only option for this house unless we want to give up one of the second floor bedrooms (which I don't think makes sense and would entail WAY more intrusive construction than we want). I agree that it's not ideal, but it is what it is. I sketched out a couple of ideas for the basement space...would you mind taking a look? Here is the current basement overall. The door on the right by the toilet leads to the new part of the basement under our kitchen addition. That space is already finished and is what I'm calling potential guest room/man cave. It has outside egress through a pair of "Dorothy doors". So the way it is now you come down stairs from the breakfast room into an unfinished basement with a cement floor, low ductwork and rubble stone walls and wind your way past open laundry, furnace, a non-functioning toilet in a tiny wood enclosure to reach the nice finished space. It's a pretty odd setup. The black dots in the sketch are steel support beams. We had an HVAC guy out yesterday who can fix most of the ducting issues. Our thought is to drywall the whole left section of the basement, adding lots of lighting and tile or pergo floors. This will give us a 12' by 24' rec room (we currently have a smallish living room and no family room upstairs, so I think this space will be important to future buyers). The plan is to use the upper right quadrant of the space for the utility functions of the basement: laundry, bathroom, furnace room. Plumbing and gas lines are already there, so I think this makes sense. It also has to serve as the hallway to the new portion of the basement. My husband's beloved workshop would get drywall and a door, but would otherwise be untouched. Here is the idea that I think I like best so far. A stacking washer and dryer and the laundry sink would be behind double pocket doors. The pocket doors would open all the way and stow in the wall by the shower. There would be a cabinet with storage below and space to fold laundry just opposite the laundry. There could be an upper cabinet or open shelves above. Access to the storage closet (which will have pretty low headroom due to ducting) would be from the rec room. Here is the other idea that I'm also considering. The stacked washer/dryer and sink would be behind double doors that swing open on heavy-duty hinges. On the inside of the left door, I could hang my iron and ironing board. On the inside of the right door would be a fold-down table. The right door would open all the way against the wall backing up to the shower and the table (I think it could be about 3' by 2') would unfold into the hallway space. In this plan, the access to the storage closet would be across from the laundry. If I wanted to keep the washer and dryer side-by-side and still have a sink, I'd have to put the sink where the shower is in the sketches above. I think it makes more sense to stack machines, keep to a smaller laundry footprint, and have a full bath with shower. So what do you think? Are either of these pretty decent substitutes for a laundry room? Thanks so much for taking the time to look and to make it through all of my rambling!

I agree, the space is too small to try to store off-season coats, etc. Try to keep them elsewhere until you've proven they'll fit. Otherwise, you'll simply set yourself up for failure. It's a kind of deep space, and the stuff that's in the "deep" area will be hard to access. That *might* let you stash out=of-season stuff there, but again, I'd suggest you wait to see. I agree w/ Frankie that the responsitionability of the Command hooks is really useful. But I also find that they aren't that sturdy for heavy coats. I'm a fan of pegboard for places like this--fill the wall with it, up and down. Then you can put some strong pegs anywhere you want, and move them around. You can have lots of hooks of various sizes, and you can put bins, even small shelves, etc. I find, actually, that shoes store better higher up. Otherwise, you're bending over,a nd bending over. I stored my shoes at about hip level, back when I had a "mudroom cabinet," and I found it was really useful. It's counterintuitive, but follow me: You kick off your shoes, and you need to then put them somewhere, which means you need to bend over and pick them up. Then you move to the storage space, and bend over and put them in the floor storage. (bending twice) Now you go to put them on. you bend over to pick them up, then you bend over again to put them on. Store them at hip level or just below, and you have them out of the prime storage space (hip to chest), but you aren't bending over twice. Backpacks (esp. heavy ones) went on the floor--that saved us having to lift them up. Swing them off your shoulder, and put them down. Consider stapling fabric shoe pockets to the left wall for shoes; or, consider not having this be a shoes-storage place. Just outdoors stuff only (boots, etc.). Shoes should go somewhere else. Are you a shoes-off household? If not, then this should be the place where only the shoes you wear outdoors go. If you are, then consider having shoes go somewhere else anyway, just to save space there. As for sitting down--don't do a permanent bench. Get a Kik-Step stool to shove in under the coats. Then you can hook it out with your feet, and sit down to put shoes on if necessary. I don't think you have enough room for a bench, anyway. For the side of the washer, consider getting magnetic organizers to hold small stuff. There are magnetic storage bins sold for laundry organizing that could hold little-kid shoes, umbrellas, hats, mittens. and for office supplies Even school lockers. or hooks to hold stuff like umbrellas, mittens, hats. If you got a strong enough hook, you could even hang shoes or boots off them,a ctually. Here is a link that might be useful: Kik-Step stool--the world's greatest invention

Every single time I've moved, I've unpacked the kitchen and put stuff in what seemed like a logical place. And every single time, about a month later, I have to completely reorganize the kitchen. So don't feel badly that you are struggling with this. I think we tend to follow the organization we had in our last kitchen, but that doesn't work for the new kitchen unless it is identical. First, for the odd, tall cabinet. Can you take out the spice rack and use it as a broom closet? Or install other shelves to make it more usable? Second, try organizing by "centers." A meal prep center. A baking center. A clean-up center. An eating center (if you have an eat-in kitchen). The prep center would have access to the sink for washing veggies, a place to chop and dice and mince, a place to cook the food. The baking center would have access to baking ingredients, the mixer, baking pans, etc. It helps to think outside the box sometimes. I had a kitchen with a small cabinet on one side of the stove and nothing but wall on the other. Like you, I tried to keep the pots and pans in the cabinet and it was a nightmare every time I tried to get something out or put something back. I finally used the small cabinet to hold cookie sheets and other baking pans on the vertical, and put a small stainless shelving unit on the other side of the stove for the pots and pans I used every day. There was plenty of cabinet space in that kitchen, but very little of it was near the stove. The stove was near the sink, so by putting the shelves where I did, I could easily grab a pan and fill it with water and put it on the stove with just a few steps. Consider putting the pots and pans in some of the drawers, if any are deep enough. It might actually be easier to deal with them in a drawer--they won't be stacked on top of each other, they will be easier to see, as some of them won't be hiding behind the others. Or put just the few pots and pans you use daily in the oven-side cabinets and store the others elsewhere in the kitchen. There's no rule that they all have to be in the same place.

Well -- check out The container Store -- and their Elfa collection OR check out California Closet for ideas too! Next -- make lists: How do hang or fold your shirts? How do you hang trousers or pants (double or hanging straight?) How many sweaters do you have? Will this closet handle ALL seasons -- or do you have storage out-of-place for out-of-season wearables? What furniture will you have in the bedroom? (dressers, armoire? a vanity for your jewelery?) What about lighting in the closet? What about having a full-length mirror (and a light?) Do you sit or stand to put on shoes? How many pairs of shoes do you have for each season --- and how do you really like them to be stored??? What about coats and outerwear??? How do store undies? Do you want to be able to dress inside the closet -- or outside in the bedroom OR in the bathroom?? Just a few things to answer that you really help you determine what kinds of infrastructure (Talley Sue's term for shelving, baskets, hanging space etc.) Hope this helps!!!