Mudroom Remodel design

What the room has to do

A mudroom is a piece of joinery in a corridor. Bench, hooks, boot storage, one cupboard for the things that have nowhere else — sized to the number of people who use the door, not to the wall it sits on.

Layout rules

• Allow 12in of hook width per person — closer and coats compress into one mass.
• A bench at 18in high and 16in deep is right for putting shoes on; deeper becomes a seat nobody clears.
• Leave 36in of circulation in front of the bench.
• Give each cubby 14in of width minimum, 16in if coats hang inside it.
• Run the wall finish to at least 48in — this is the wall that takes the damage.

Lighting plan

Bright and immediate. A mudroom is used in the ten seconds after coming in, usually with full hands, so put it on a motion sensor or a switch at the door and skip anything that needs adjusting.

What usually goes wrong

• Joinery sized to the available wall rather than to the household, so it is full on day one.
• A bench too deep to sit on comfortably and too shallow to store under.
• Beautiful flooring in the one room that is guaranteed to be wet and gritty.
• Open cubbies at eye height, so the first thing you see entering the house is other people's bags.

In a small one

With less than 5ft of wall, drop the bench and take the full height for hooks and a shelf. A cramped bench you have to shuffle around is worse than none.