Laundry in the Kitchen

Most North American kitchens don't include laundry facilities, but there are some good reasons why you might consider including them in your kitchen design.

Convenience

Whoever decided that the best place for the washer and dryer was in the basement - often in an unfinished area with a dusty concrete floor and spidery open-joist ceiling - didn't do laundry very often. Especially if you have kids, a laundry area in the kitchen will be much easier to get to and use, and usually be nearer the bedrooms where much of the laundry is produced.

Cost

The kitchen already has water supply and drain lines ready to hook your washer into, so if you do want to move out of the basement, it's a good place to move to without having to pay for major plumbing work. You will almost certainly need to run new electrical circuits though, if you want an electric dryer. A gas dryer may be a good choice if you already have a gas supply to the kitchen for your range.


Space-saving

A stacked washer and dryer in the kitchen uses much less space than the regular full sized separate appliances in their own laundry room. Consider using the laundry room for something else completely - maybe you can remove a wall and combine it with the kitchen, maybe you need mudroom space for your large family, or maybe it could be a home office, craft room or darkroom.

Do you have a kitchen laundry? Would you have one? Why or why not?

Clear off that kitchen counter

Not necessarily ALL the counters, but clearing everything off the stretch of kitchen counter you use most for prep and baking makes a big difference in how easy it is to work. It makes for less cleaning, too, when you don’t have to wipe spatters off half a dozen doodads sitting at the back of the counter!

If there are often-used things which deserve to be "always out" in that counter area, try mounting them on the wall: magnetic strips hold knives and other items, mini-shelves hold condiments and spices, hooks and racks hold cups and mugs. Need to have a small appliance sitting there? Try an under-cabinet mounted version to get it off the counter.

Once you have a clean sweep of counter to work on, you’ll cherish it.

Work Zones or Work Centers

Today, the traditional work triangle is often not enough to describe how a kitchen will work. Modern kitchen layouts involving more appliances (extra sink, dishwasher(s), separate cooktop and oven(s), microwave oven, etc.) have more potential work stations which the triangle can't account for. And if you add more cooks to a single triangle, it's a recipe for tripping over each other.

The tool used to solve these problems in design is the concept of work centers or zones. A work center groups everything needed to do a specific type of task into a single area.

The three major zones are:

Food Prep Center
Cooking Center
Cleanup Center

Depending on your cooking and eating style, you may have other work centers too:

Baking Center
Snack Center
Eating Center

There is some overlap between the equipment and materials needed in each zone. Where you choose to keep what depends on your cooking style and needs, the size of your kitchen, and placement of centers near each other. You might also choose to duplicate some things (anything from measuring cups to dishwashers) in several work centers if you have the space and it makes work more convenient.

More details on work zones in kitchen layouts