New Laundry Rooms Are Multi-Purpose

MELVILLE, N.Y. -- It's not that Christopher Dubs actually likes doing laundry. But now that it can be accomplished in a wide-open, perfectly functional room that doubles as a play area for his son, the old family chore is hardly what it used to be.

"Being a single father, I realized I spent a lot of time with my child and in the laundry room," says Dubs, an architectural designer who lives in Amagansett. So this winter, he transformed his built- in garage into an all-in-one space to work, play and relax with his 5-year-old son, Chasen.

To relieve the backache in folding and ironing, there's a marble countertop over a new pair of front-loading machines. For organizing tools, cleaning supplies, light bulbs and pet accessories, there are space-saving, built-in cabinets. To keep toys and playthings in their place, a pair of built-in bookcases flank a bay window with bench seating.

No, this certainly is not your grandmother's or even your mother's laundry room.

When it's laundry time, Dubs sets out art supplies for Chasen on the low wood coffee table or pulls a stool up to the counter so they can work together.

"You try to fit all these things in your life and still spend quality time with your kids," says Dubs, 44, whose laundry room upgrade cost about $30,000. "Now, I can multitask with him."

Big, beautiful laundry rooms are cropping up in homes across the country. Experts say it's a result of homeowners' ongoing desires to revamp their living space to better suit their lifestyles.

"We're seeing a huge amount of renovations," says Rita Williams, a Jacksonville, Fla.-based expert in national housing design trends. "We all have laundry, and we all have to deal with it."

Washers and dryers slowly began migrating north from the basement to the first or second floors in the mid-1990s, says Pam Rogers, director of Whirlpool brand laundry machines. The trend escalated as more people realized the convenience of not having to carry load after load up and down multiple flights of stairs. Smaller, stackable machines were hidden in closets off master bedrooms and bathrooms, or traditional side-by-side machines were tucked into ground-floor utility areas.

After Whirlpool's first pair of energy-efficient front-loaders, Duet, debuted in 2001, washers and dryers were suddenly thrust into plain sight, out of the crowded mudrooms and dark basements, Rogers says.

"People want them to look nice," Rogers says, because they're in high-traffic areas of the house. Consumer demand for quieter machines and complementary storage solutions soon followed.

Now, Williams says, oversized laundry rooms are practically standard fare in new-home construction. Some are designed as all-in- one spaces for crafting, bill-paying and children's activities. Such was the case at the 2006 Hamptons Cottages and Gardens Idea House in Water Mill, which featured a lower-level laundry room complete with a gift-wrapping station, potting bench, a built-in ironing cupboard and a flat-screen TV.

"Whatever your need is, you can make this room work for you," says Susanne Kelley of Hampton Design Kitchens Baths, the company that dreamed up this room and sold Dubs the cabinets for his, too.

She's seen laundry rooms with built-in dog washing stalls, computer workstations, recycling centers and extensive linen storage.

"People are trying to accommodate their needs," says Randi Puccio, an interior decorator with LRS Designs in Huntington who helped the Waxes with their renovation. She says some Long Islanders are starting to incorporate multiple laundry areas in their home, especially if they have children.

That's what Joe and Kim Willen did last year, though purely by accident. Their Northport home had a first-floor laundry area off the family room, but Kim says it was too small for sorting and folding. While the space was being enlarged and remodeled to add a sink, storage cabinets and a countertop set over a pair of new front- loaders, the Willens set up a temporary laundry space in the basement with their original machines, and it stuck.

"We just decided to keep them down there," says Kim Willen, 43, who has three daughters, Rachel, 13, Hannah, 11, and Grace, 6. It's become a handy place to wash excess loads of post-vacation laundry and piles of beach towels in the summer.

Upstairs, the laundry room doubles as an overflow storage area for kitchen platters and keeps cleaning supplies handy.

Homeowners considering a laundry-room makeover should draft a list of all the things they'd like to be able to do in the space, says Puccio.

"You want to design it in a fashion so that it's an appealing and pleasant place to be in," she says.

As for storage, Rogers says consumer demand has prompted Whirlpool to launch a new line of accessory towers, pedestals and work surfaces designed to streamline the routine.

In the end, the effort will have a significant payoff. "The task doesn't become as tedious," Puccio says.

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