Rearranging My Awkward Closet Into a Real Laundry Room With Built Ins

It worked out REALLY well to have the machine on the right because it literally takes up 30 inches of space, the exact width of one of my closet doors. I built a little “wall” with bead board to cover up the side of the machine and provide support for that side of the counter. And, also, for looks as you can see my closet doors are basically just sheers that are framed out.

It was at this point that I decided that rolling doors here would work better for me then the hinged doors. I took the closet doors down, removed their hinges and then created a frame at the top for them to be sandwiched in. I did this by removing the trim on the outside and lowering (and leveling) the top piece of trim across the top of the doorway. I did the same thing on the inside of the doorway with another 1×4. 

Then I just added casters to my doors and removed the knob on the door on the inside. This makes a lot more sense! The door on the inside on the right I will rarely (if ever) use and the door on the left rolls easily. They also lift and come out in the event I need them totally out of the way.

I knew I wasn’t going to be putting much weight on these shelves so I just put 4″ screws in at angles through the bottoms of them into the studs behind – leveling as I went.

With the shelves “floating” I covered my angled cut with a 1×8 which also served to cover the gap between the wall and the cabinet. With 1x4s I trimmed out all of my shelves and also added 1×4 trim across the top of the large board I added to cover my black hole, the cabinets and my top shelf here, to make them all look connected and deliberate.