Chute! There's Laundry on the Floor

Have you ever lived in a small house with small rooms and small closets? Where did you keep your dirty laundry? Perhaps it was the most logical place...the bedroom floor. We have been frustrated by the difficulty of keeping order with respect to laundry. The washer and dryer are in the basement and there isn't much  space for a hamper upstairs. During the time that we used the basement bathroom things were a little better because we kept the hamper in the bathroom where we most often changed clothes. But, we knew that someday we'd have a proper bathroom upstairs and would need a laundry solution. Occasionally, you'd find Nick or me standing alone in the basement staring at the ceiling dreaming of where we might be able to install a laundry chute. We equally concluded that there was just one place that would work, and that was in the hallway. So, before any further work, it only made sense to build the chute since it would involve some destruction to the wall.

Nick carefully pried the baseboard off the wall and marked where the chute would go, giving consideration to where he calculated the studs to be.

Remove baseboard, cut starting hole.	Nick saws.

The jig saw works well for cutting nice straight lines with minimal collateral damage to the wall. We found the perfect sized cabinet door at a construction salvage shop. It has a similar profile to our existing doors and no major dings. With some sanding and painting, it'll be perfect!

Not too bad!	Salvaged cabinet door.

Next, we got some sheet metal and a tool that helps bend it to make perfect corners. The tool is basically two steel rectangles welded together with a gap between them. You slip the metal into the gap and bend. I called my brother, a sheet metal expert, and inquired about the best tool for cutting the metal. The sheet metal scissors are $20 or $30, so we wanted to get it right.

Nick's sheet metal construction.	My, what nice seams you have!

Nick figured out exactly how to build the chute so that there would be no visible seams where the sheet metal pieces are joined and no sharp edges that might catch on our clothing. His ability to construct things so perfectly is amazing to me!

Perfect fit.	Voila!

The chute was then placed in its new home and the baseboard put back in place. The final photo represents a couple of imperfections not worth pointing out, but that will be corrected in time. We haven't actually used the chute yet because it isn't connected to anything in the basement. Although it's pretty narrow, we ensured that we'd still be able to pass our garments through. I love how it came out! It is at home in our hallway.