Our cubbies were probably the best thing that we did when we built the new house! They run the length of a 12' wall and connect the breakfast room and laundry. Across from them is the entrance to the garage and powder room.

O M G, That is an amazing wall!!! I wish I had that kind of space to work with...

What's in all those cubbies these days? Do you use baskets or colored bins in some?

Thank you for posting the pictures-I already added them to my "mudroom ideas" folder :)

Oh Persnicketydesign, what a wonderful space!!

No, I don't have a mudroom but sure wish I did!

My neighbor carved one out of a closet. The side door to her kitchen is right there, what a perfect spot for a mudroom and I so wish I had the same floor plan.

It's perfect...has everything a person would need as they are going out the door, including the dog leash hanging nice and neat, not thrown in a drawer to become tangled with all the other quap in the same drawer (don't ask).

My neighbor has several foster children at one time.
She buys inexpensive metal mail boxes..the rural type with door and little red flag, and allows each child to paint their own.

Each large cubby has a mailbox.
The cubby holds larger papers and drawings the kids bring home and the mailbox holds paperwork/notices from teachers, things that need to be signed and sent back.

She has plenty of hooks for coats and hats and also a place and hook for her gardening gloves and gardening apron. She has several totes lined with Sunbrella Fabric and they hold her outdoor/gardening shoes.

There is also a larger tote (covered in Sunbrella) for the kids' shoes.

I'll just continue to sigh when I see these wonderful mud rooms here at GW.

A mudroom was a priority for me with 9 children still at home and living in the country. I love mine so much I could see sitting in there reading a good book.
My mudroom/back hall area is quite large. It includes my laundry room, utility bathroom cubbies for each child. It has a dutch door entrance from the back of the house which will be the children's main door in & out.
Here are some pics. Painting is not complete, benches & cubbies will be black.

We had a mudroom in our last house that I really miss. We moved the laundry out of the room because it was never functional to come in from the garage to laundry and coats etc. The room was then big enough to create 4 cubbies, a corner closet for vacuum hose etc, hooks for guest coats and a sink with storage above and below. My favorite part was that in each cubbie was a small shelf with an outlet so that everyone could charge phones, hand held games etc. Before that everything was in my kitchen! If I can find a picture or two on my husband's computer I'll post it later.
Judy

I have a LOVE/ hate relationship w/ my mudroom. Our kitchen frig is in it along w/ the microwave. It is uninsulated & a catchall. One of my goals this Spring is to reclaim this space - hopefully get the frig IN the kitchen and build cubbies like the ones above.

Thanks! Actually, the kids have been really good about putting their things away when they walk in the door. I'm glad that we left the bottoms open. I think that if we would have closed them off or added baskets for shoes they wouldn't be quite so diligent about putting them away. They're really easy to keep clean too. I just vacuum them out and do a quick wipe down with a damp micro fiber cloth if they need it.

I have been looking for some baskets for the sides, but am having a hard time finding that many of them that match in the right size. For now a few of the cubes have "cutsie" stuff in them like this.

ACF...Did you get to moved in yet? I can't wait to see all the pics!!!

Like Ttod, I have an uninsulated mudroom off the back of my kitchen, measuring 7.5'x9'. It has a door to the back garden and to-the-ceiling shelves on three sides. My big problem with it is the "uninsulated" part. Right now it's a storage room for lots of stuff while our house renovation continues; in normal times it has some kitchen storage overflow (like a big roasting pan), extra cases of beer and water, and gardening equipment. I like the idea of storage off the kitchen, as it's much more convenient than running down to the basement and it's a great extra refrigerator during the winter for beverages and refrigerated items. The downside is that it is unusable in the summer for any food and it is an energy drain on the house.

persnickety --love that sign, & your mudroom. Not moved in yet. Calling for occupancy on Monday, hope to be moving in next weekend.
I will be so happy to share pics, you will all get tired of seeing them I am sure.

HI have a wonderful room- it's a combo of mudroom/laundry/dog room/tack room all in one. It's by far the most valuable room in our home. I just posted pics in a thread on the homebuilding forum last week.

We still have a few things to add - like our cubbies/lockers

Here's a link. Just a warning, I had to take these pics for my sister who needed them quickly for her contractor.... so they are showing my clutter room WITH CLUTTER - just as it was intended. Keep in mind this room keeps all of this stuff OUT of the rest of my home!!!

Here is a link that might be useful: Our Clutter room

I do love the look of the open cubbies and the long benches. Anything that helps the kids pick up after themselves is on my priority list.
Adding outlets within each person's own space is a great tip too!! Between cell phones, cameras, DS's and Leapsters there are times I have trouble finding an empty outlet in my kitchen!

Thanks so much for sharing. I never get tired of the photos or useful information on this site.

If you're in a colder or wetter climate, another thing to consider is the placement of heating registers or wall heaters in the mudroom (assuming you have forced air heat, or old-fashioned steam radiators) -- up here in Maine, ours get draped all winter long with wet hats, mittens, socks, cats ... It might be advantageous to design your mudroom with this useful drying/heating function in mind. Maybe place at least one register slightly higher than normal to heat the top of a bench, etc, where wet things can be spread out?

I have a serious case of mudroom envy whenever I see persnickety and acountryfarms gorgeous mudrooms. Ours is quite a bit more modest. I could have done more cubbies, but then I would have lost our coat closet. I ended up splitting our 7 ft wall in the mud/laundry room into approximately 4 ft of coat closet and 3 ft of cubbies. We have a family of four. I keep off season stuff and extra coats contained in the coat closet and keep stuff we are using regularly in the cubbies.

Here is a picture taken in a pristine state right after we moved in.

We've been in about 6 months now (Gosh, how can that be?) and I really like how the space works for us. The cubbies have a charging station for cell phones. The boys are able to get their shoes and boots into the cubbies below the bench. The main part of the cubbies have 4 hooks each (8 total) for bags and coats and the bench acts as a catch all for library books, my market basket and whatever else is is in transition between coming and going in our house. In the upper cubbies, we stash dog collars, leashes, hats and gloves, my DH's hunting maps, the kids science experiment kit that I don't want them to do alone but I've been too lazy to hide somewhere else. You get the idea... Catchall. Here is a picture today. You can see more "stuff" has landed here in the last 6 months, but it still feels contained and relatively neat to me. I'm just glad stuff ends up here instead of on my kitchen island.

Our mudroom measures 8'9" x 8'2", plus a little hallway and closet area near doors. We have 2 exterior doors (garage & side porch). Not moved in yet, so pardon the dust. hooks, knobs and pulls to go on in the next couple weeks

We live in the north, so room for boots was a must, as well as porcelain flooring that didn't need to be cared for! We allotted space for everyone (2 cabs, 1 locker with 2 hooks, and 1 drawer each). Also included corner shelves (with outlets hidden in there) for the catch-all stuff. I also plan on doing a calendar/school notes, etc. on one of the walls once we move in. Mudroom sink was a must for DH for those occasions when instant hand washing is needed when coming in the door!

Though not nearly as nice as the mudrooms shown above, I *LOVE* ours!!! We come directly into it from the garage. It's about 7 x 10, and on one side it has a beadboard wall with a bench with baskets in cubbies below (open underneath for easy cleaning) and coat hooks with a shelf above. On the other side is a small broom closet and a utility sink next to it with a window above (so we have nice lighting during daylight hours). The utility sink comes in VERY handy! On the wall just as you come into the mudroom from the garage we have an area with a large magnetic whiteboard and a corkboard so we have plenty of room for papers and photos that come home from school. We also added hooks for keys on the bottom of the corkboard frame. We thought about putting in chargers for phones, etc., but opted to put that in another area.

Here are a couple of photos for you:

{{!gwi}}

Good luck with your project! Have fun with it!

jamielo, if you don't mind, do you have the measurments of your mudroom? I love your design, and we will only have about 3 feet width to work with in our new home for a mudroom.

I live in the Pacific Northwest where it rains all the time. We invented mud! But I've never seen a mud room in any house. Is it an east coast thing? A midwest thing?

Boy, some of your mudrooms make me drool with envy!

Here's a photo of ours. It had been a mudroom/laundry combination, but was too small to function effectively as both. So I moved the laundry to our unfinished full basement (good for something!) and dedicated the space to a single use. It's no more than 6x8, and connects the garage to the rest of the house.

There are only two of us. We have a pair of open cubes to stow briefcases and handbags. Some organizational cubbies for papers, bills, keys. Some open shelving for shoes. A sink. An outlet so we can have a charging station for phones, Blackberries, Kindles, etc. On the opposite wall (not visible), I have beadboard going up about 6 feet, with a row of hooks at the top for coats (there is also a separate coat closet just inside the house) ... we do have a coat problem (i.e. too many, but still never enough...).

When I have a big party, I use the room as a butler's pantry or beverage center. (Some of the cabinets hold placemats, napkins, etc.).

eliza_824, Here is a sketch that I sent to my cabinet maker from which the cabinets were made. Like I said, I had just a little over 36" squeeze the cabinets into. Hope that helps and good luck! Jaymie

Hmmm...interesting question, Oceanna. Although I've lived in The South for nearly 20 years, I grew up in the PNW and the snow country of the Rockies. Now that I think about it, I don't remember ever seeing a mudroom in anyone's house either. I do remember mudrooms popping up in a few of the high end homes here around 15 years ago and now almost all of the new construction houses that I go into have built-ins for coats & shoes in a back hall or laundry room.

We had 'em in Michigan.

Persnickety, what state is "here?"

I just have to laugh because we're the mud capital of the US right here in the greater Seattle area, and no mud rooms. Maybe they're in new construction, dunno -- the yards are all too small in new construction so when I bought this I didn't even go look at new. I like my big yard. :o)

Would those of you who put up the wonderful pictures please go add your photos to the Gallery thread? Here's the link... thanks!

Here is a link that might be useful: Laundry/Mud Room Eye Candy - please post yours!

Sheesh...I'm such an airhead. LOL We're in GA...about 10 miles outside of Augusta.

Love to post some pics in the eye candy thread!

It's been great to see many different styles people use to tame the clutter. I especially appreciate the spaces that are "in use" as well as all of the advice offered.

With another 10" of snow today I'm REALLY wanting this project to happen!!

I too have a love/hate relationship with my mudroom. Everyone stands in the doorway and just kicks off and flings their shoes in the room. Same with coats and backpacks. I always envisioned the mess being hidden behind a closed door, but no one will ever close the darn door!

We have a mudroom exactly 6'x9, with a 'bump-out' closet, door to the garage, and door to the kitchen. So room wasn't really ample enough for "cubbies". We simply built mini racks instead.

My wife and I are pretty hard-core DIY-ers, so we built it out (by hand) the best way we could (functionally and looks) with the limited space afforded.

Before:

After: