Pocket door. If you're taking the wall down, adding a pocket door will be easy and they are not that expensive. I have 5 of them in my house. I love them.

sorry for the confusion, that wall is not one that is coming down, completely different wall. Just saying there will be a bit of construction going on so that if we were going to put in a pocket door now would be the time to do it.

I would do a pocket door. You said the regular door took up wall space when open and that was a problem. Well, a barn door will do the same. Also what is your style. Do you love barn doors? If so, then it might be worth it.

@hcbm sorry think I need to edit my post again. this is my first post ever and feel like I obviously didn't explain things well. When you come in off the garage you're in a hall. On the right there is a door opening to the laundry room. The door that had been there opened inward so then we couldn't use the wall on the right side of the laundry room, for coat hooks or things like that. The pocket door would go in towards the left, and if it were a barn door it would be on the outside of the laundry room and would be along the hallway which leads into the kitchen. Since it's a hall that wall can't really be used for much, we had a mirror hanging there before but that's it.

People here hate barn doors. But if it’s a regular wall, I am under the impression that it will not have room for a pocket door. You would need to have the construction people redo the wall and add the pocket door. For that case, I would opt for the barn door instead. Doesn’t have to actually look like a barn door. There are many styles.

added a pic to the post to show a very quick, not to scale sketch of where the doors are. red is door that was removed. Green is where pocket door would be. Purple is where barn door would be. Totally not to scale.

How wide is your hallway? Sliding "barn" doors will definitely take away some width from your hallway. If your hallway is wide enough, a sliding "barn" door would work. I don't think the sliding door is too trendy. I think it's the sliding door that looks like it came out of a barn that is trendy.

I’d find out the cost to have a pocket door added, because I have a feeling it would be quite a bit more than adding a barn door if the wall isn’t otherwise being worked on. I’d also find out how much more narrow the pocket door would make the hallway vs the barn door. Last thought, with a pocket door, you could have a cat door cut out in the bottom so that it can be closed when you want for sound dampening, but still accessible for the cats (though my cats wouldn’t go near an operating laundry set up haha!).

@justlol good question on the width of the hallway...of all the measurements I do have, apparently that is one that I don't. It's the width of a standard steel door because that's the opening to the garage, plus door trim around it.

oh, think I just found it on another drawing, but there are so many numbers all overlapping it was hard to read. I believe it is 2'8".

Our home has a media room which is accessed via barn doors. My experience with them regarding sound transmission is that they do very little to dampen noise entering or exiting the space. Too many gaps that allow noise to be transmitted. They look nice and are very trendy currently as someone earlier pointed out, but I can see getting tired of them in a few years. Pocket doors are more timeless and may offer more noise suppression.

Here is my sliding “barn” door for a very similar situation. This one leads to my basement staircase area, it is a hallway situation, but what you can’t see from the photo is that where I’m standing to take the photo is a tight hallway area. To my immediate right is the door to our garage. Directly behind me is the door to our laundry room. Originally, to my immediate left was a small coat closet, but we walled that up because on the other side of the wall is now a kitchen pantry. To the left of the barn door is the hallway leading into our kitchen, and what you see in the background to the right of the barn door is the hallway leading to our foyer with the dining room (that we use as a music room) to the right. The barn door was originally a traditional swinging door, but it was a hazard whenever it was open because that is a very well trafficked walkway. My original thought was to reverse the swing on the basement door, but that was a no-go as well because the landing at the top of the basement staircase is too small. We couldn’t do a pocket door because there was electrical there we didn’t want to move, and it’s a firewall, so not gonna mess with THAT! So a sliding door was our best solution. As you can see, mine isn’t rustic, and it happens to coordinate very well with a lot of the remodeling we’ve done in our adjacent kitchen and some other areas of our home. It’s noisy to open and close, but it still solved a real problem we had prior to that. It doesn’t block all of the noise, but it does cut down on noise coming from the basement. (We have five kids... our three teenaged boys “live” down in that basement, LOL!) I have seen some sliding barn doors that are a bit different in that they actually do seal along the sides when closed... I’m not sure where to get them, but I know they exist. Hope that helps!

Putting a pocket door into an existing wall is not an easy task, and often not even possible. Honestly, I’d put the swinging door back and rearrange storage in the laundry room. Unless you’re willing to go to the expense of rebuilding that wall. That said, either one would be preferable to a barn door, IMO.

The only other thing I can think of is shifting that whole doorway to the left as you face it from the hallway. Would that make your hanging storage work better? Still less invasive than the pocket door.

If resale is any consideration in your decision, go with a pocket door. It will be more expensive, though.

How about just putting a dog door into a regular door for the cats. Or double doors.

We have a “barn” door much the same as the modern door of skmom. Ours is a custom birch door with a Lee Valley handle. It greatly reduces the noise from our laundry room. It has a sleek modern Scandinavian look. Strangely enough, one of our cats has learned how to open it! Installation was pretty straightforward and didn’t involve opening up a wall.

If the choices are only pocket door or barn door, then I’d pick a pocket (ha!) door, which I have. However, if you’re open to the idea, double doors, like oaktonmom suggested, is an option worth considering. That’s what I’ll be replacing my laundry room door with, because of the congestion in that area of my house (laundry room door, closet door and garage door all open into a 4’ x 8’ vestibule of sorts). Like your ex, I took the laundry room door of its hinges (I didn’t throw mine away though!) while I was working on reconfiguring the closet that’s catty corner to it because I kept banging stuff against the always-slightly-ajar laundry room damn door (apparently the laundry room is a popular place for cat bathrooms).

Plus, the good thing about a traditional swinging door (or two) is that, if storage space really is at a premium, you can hang things on the back of the door, like the ironing board, mops and brooms, clothes rod, wire shelving for cleaning supplies, etc., which you could not do with a barn or pocket door.

And here are some clever ideas for those of you whose laundry room pulls double doody as a cat restroom:

I like the idea of both door types but I think in the area described a pocket door is the best way to go.

Sharing the barn door to our laundry. Our laundry room is to the left as you come in our back door. The laundry includes a sink and toilet, to the right in this photo. We hung an old, solid wood office door with a frosted upper window that we found at an architectural recycling store from a 'barn'/sliding door track. Maybe because the door is so solid, it works great. My husband installed it himself. (And, yes the appliances can slide out for repair. :) ).

@snowcountry can't put the sliding door on the inside because there will either be cabinets for storage or ideally built in white locker/bench type things for coats, shoes, etc.

by barn door I guess I meant more just the sliding door with the exposed hardware that's become trendy, not necessarily rustic barn looking.

there's electrical in the wall, in the hall for the light switch, and inside the laundry room the switch for that light, so either one we do we will have to move the electricity for one, or both, light switches. I feel like I'd rather do the pocket door but due to the cost will probably have to go with the sliding door. This whole project is getting to be way too expensive, and if we do the sliding door we don't even have to do it now, can put it off for a long time, since we haven't had a door in 10+ years, but if we did the pocket door we'd have to incur that expense now. Still thinking...

I would just put the same door back up that you had to start with. I would then put skinny storage on the wall behind the door (or the door itself) and your mud room bench on the wall where you were thinking about a pocket door. You could even turn cabinets and go toward the washer. People are putting the litter box inside a lower cabinet with a cut out in the front or end. Then put the Kitty Pass that Sammy showed in the door. That is so cute that I wish I had a place to use it!

That wouldn't involve a big remodel, would look and work well for now, and you would not loose much if you decide to change down the road. If ex took the door down, you probably only need a door, hinges, and a knob. You won't need a prehung door.

Don't fall into the trap I did for so many years. I thought everything had to be perfect and finished forever, so therefore NOTHING was done.