Our full-size washer and dryer are in our kitchen behind folding doors. I actually prefer having the laundry in the kitchen to having a separate laundry room. Having it in the dead center of the house - where we are every day and don't have enough room to let it all pile up - encourages me to keep the laundry washed, dried, folded, and away. I can't let it sit in a laundry room/basement. I can start a load while feeding my toddler or waiting for water to boil. Now, I just need a SMALLER place so I have an excuse for those gorgeous stackable sets in sleek titanium gray. :D

Washers in the kitchen were the norm in most middle-class houses well into the 60's and 70's. My guess is that it was logical given that plumbing connections were readily available, and the kitchen was basically the "headquarters" for the typical housewife. It is convenient for multitasking, but given the option I would prefer either a separate laundry room close the kitchen; or near the bedrooms which is a trend these days in new houses and makes a lot of sense given that most things that need to be washed (clothes, bedding, towels) are located in the bedroom area or floor.

I should point out that I have a washer in my kitchen in the city, because of the plumbing (I dry on racks); but in or suburban place, our washer/drier are in a separate closet around the corner from the kitchen:
http://www.thekitchn.com/thekitchn/kitchen-tours/kitchen-tour-franks-114250

Be especially careful about contaminating your kitchen counters, etc, if you are doing laundry there.

I have a small galley kitchen at the far end of which is a smaller laundry room. I've considered removing the wall between them so as to feel less cramped. I read that that would be a bad move as far as resale value, but the above photos look good to me.

We recently renovated our apartment and the only possible place for the washer and dryer was in a closet in the kitchen (which had been a broom closet, and which we built out to accomodate a stacking washer and dryer). While we put them there out of necessity, it's turned about to be the best place for them. We never forget about laundry, it isn't really a chore since it's so close, and as another poster has said, you can do laundry while doing other things in the kitchen. If we move to another house, we'd now strongly consider moving the washer and dryer from wherever they are to the kitchen, if possible.

How would you contaminate your counters by doing laundry in the kitchen?

Our washer and dryer is in our kitchen--our house is from the 50s and there really isn't anywhere else to put them. They're currently side by side, but I think we'll stack them when it's time to renovate--i need the space for an extra cabinet.

I grew up with a washer and dryer in a closet in the kitchen. It's very easy to let the kitchen table turn into a semi-permanent waystation for clothes and linens to be folded or put away. We were constantly clearing piles at mealtimes. If you're a bit more diligent about putting the clothes away right away its a great location though!

@Rebbeca_South - Seriously. The raw meat I prepare on my counters probably has alot more bacteria than any of my dirty clothes....

I had a all-in-one washer/dryer under my kitchen counter when I lived in the UK. I loved it. Although where I live now, I am without laundry and would be happy with a machine anywhere in my apartment.

I 100% agree with stealthkitten. We have our washer and dryer in our teeny tiny kitchen and I really wish we had a laundry room. I think it's great if you're diligent about keeping up with where laundry goes before/after. When we're not, we usually end up with laundry baskets in the way of our oven and stove.

I purchased a 50s home with a stacked w&d in the kitchen. It is what it is, and it is no trouble at all. The laundry comes in to be washed and leaves immediately upon exiting the dryer. The kitchen is all white, and the white appliances work well.

Hailing from the UK, its 100% the norm to have your washer in the kitchen - it just makes so much more sense. Perhaps because the kitchen is at the back of the house, so you do your washing and then go hang it out in the garden. Dryers are not the norm so its easy to just incorporate a washer under the worktop - their height is designed for it.

isn't this a typical arrangement in europe? i always thought it seemed quite practical, myself. image 1 is gorgeous.

In Australian apartments it's very common to have a washer/dryer in the kitchen (it's often called a 'european' laundry as the idea was borrowed from Europe where they also quite often have a front loading washer/dryer behind a cupboard in the kitchen or bathroom) and so I do find it very strange that here in Boston many apartments don't have a washer/dryer in the apartment at all or a lot of the time they are in the basement... I find this so illogical considering that a lot of basements are either unfinished (ie in the case of houses) or not finished off very well so there's lots of dust etc (ie you are taking your clean clothes in to a dirty/dusty environment???) - again I find it very strange that people would keep going up and down flights of stairs (even if you are in a house you need to go down at least one flight) to wash/dry their clothes and in such an inconvenient place ie away from the bedrooms or the main part of the house where you happen to be doing other things and where it is much more convenient... even in a small apartment a front loading washer/dryer combo will only take up a small amount of room in the kitchen or bathroom - I never ever thought that being able to wash/dry clothes INSIDE the apartment would become such a luxury... my pet peeve as you can see
PS I also don't understand how having the washer/dryer in the kitchen would amount to clean laundry sitting around in piles in the kitchen near food - it takes 2 minutes to fold clothes after they are dry and another 2 mins to put them straight away... it's very quick and easy if you do it as you go :)

Our last home had a tiny kitchen with the w/d at the far end. Out of the way for cooking, but close enough to be convenient. I miss it.

We kept the hampers in the bedroom upstairs and I sorted the laundry there. I only brought down the laundry I'd be washing that day.

Would worry about stooping with under-counter units which seem the easiest to disguise if not stacked in a closet. How do people have those find the ergonomics?

In the course of living in several apartments, I've been fortunate to have my washer and dryer housed in the kitchen. This has given me easy access to the kitchen faucet and sink for portable units and to tap electrical, plumbing and drain lines for conventional units. Having laundry units in the kitchen also allows me to multitask and isolates machine noises there keeping the rest of the apartment quiet.

In my first apartment, the nonexistent workspace around a "freestanding" range was resolved by placing my apartment sized top-load washer adjacent to the range and using a butcher block top on it when not in use. The dryer resided in a dining room closet and on wash day, the nearby dining table performed well as a laundry folding table.

Today the washer and dryer are stacked inside a purpose-built cabinet, part of a wall of cabinets in my kitchen's dining area.

I dream of someday having a kitchen that I can put a front loading washer into; if that day ever comes, though, I think I'm going to have a hell of a time finding a washer small enough to fit under the counter-top- all the front-loaders in HD and Lowes are 2/3 as tall as I am!

Our washer/dryer is in the kitchen, and I think we would kill for an alternative to our laundry nook. I do think moving to a stacked option would def help with our current lack of space.

I think it's a great idea! I'd rather have them in a closet in the kitchen, and use all the leftover "laundry room" space to make my kitchen bigger :)

Right now we don't have a washer... we go to my in-laws' house on weekends to do laundry. (Hey, we're newlyweds haha)

We live in Munich were space is at an über premium and have had our washer and dryer in our kitchen (under the counter) for the over 15 years. My dream is actually to have a master suite big enough for a small laundry room... sigh.

I don't like the idea of the washer/dryer in a kitchen. Actually my laundry room is a small room off the bathroom on the second floor of my house, where our bedrooms are. For me that makes much more sense.

Just having a washing machine inside my living space again would be fabulous, whether inside the kitchen, bathroom, closet - not to have to go down to a grungy apartment house basement or out to a commercial laundromat in all kinds of weather - would be heavenly.

While I agree that it's a convenient arrangement, there's just something I can't like about having the laundry in the kitchen. It stresses me out just looking at it. I suppose it's because I see laundry as work and food as play.

While I agree that it's a convenient arrangement, there's just something I can't like about having the laundry in the kitchen. It stresses me out just looking at it. I suppose it's because I see laundry as work and food as play.

My stacking washer/dryer is in a tiny nook in my bedroom. :( I'd love to have it in the kitchen/living area, even though it's a noisy bugger--so much more convenient.

(Sorry for the double comment -- had a glitch there.)

I'd go without a tub in the bathroom to have laundry and a shower stall there rather than the kitchen. In Sweden the bathroom is the normal location for washer/dryer unless there's a separate laundry room in apartment (and there's almost always a communal laundry for big stuff).

Yuck. Lol. The idea of doing laundry in the kitchen just seems WRONG to me. I have UK friends who have grown up with that and to them it is the norm. It's a running joke between us.

Asko appliances make fully built-in 24" wide washers and dryers. That means that you could insert a panel that matches the other cabinet fronts of your kitchen exactly, and have it all blend in seamlessly. We live in a small 1,000 sq/ft condo, and a laundry wouldn't work for us in the already small galley kitchen. We're looking to install a stackable 24" wide built-in Asko washer and dryer in a tiny towel closet in the master bathroom. When it's done, you won't even know it's there, but it will be ever so convenient.

Our washer dryer is stacked in the kitchen. We hacked an IKEA pantry when we redid the kitchen - so the pantry really only has 3 sides and no bottom. It's drilled into the cabinets beside it and attached the frosted glass doors from IKEA. It's super convenient and we even have space at the top to store the shorter bottles of detergent!

"Be especially careful about contaminating your kitchen counters, etc, if you are doing laundry there."

Afraid your clean underwear is going to get your kitchen counters dirty???

"Would worry about stooping with under-counter units which seem the easiest to disguise if not stacked in a closet. How do people have those find the ergonomics?"

The same way we do with front-loading dryers...

"The idea of doing laundry in the kitchen just seems WRONG to me...
...It's a running joke between us."

I suspect I know what the joke is.

Our washer and dryer are in the kitchen of our house built in the early 60's. It is a vast improvement over our other house where the laundry room was outside under the carport.

It seems odd to me to have them in the kitchen. I would want a door to cover them. I grew up with the laundry room in the basement with a slop sink between the washer and dryer. I wouldn't want that in my kitchen.

Hey, I'm just sayin'---this is from Today Health:

"Any time you transfer underwear from the washer to the dryer, you’re getting E. coli on your hands. Just one soiled undergarment can spread bacteria to the whole load and machine.

Reduce the risk: Run your washer at 150 degrees (you can check the temperature of your washing-machine water with a candy thermometer) and wash whites with bleach (not the color-safe type; it doesn’t pack the same punch), which kills 99.9 percent of bugs. Transfer wet laundry to the dryer quickly so germs don’t multiply, wash underwear separately (there’s about a gram of feces in every pair of dirty underwear) and dry for at least 45 minutes. Wash your hands after laundering."

Yeah, the kitchen is a nice idea, but I really feel a stackable washer/dryer or a 2 in 1 in the bathroom would be heaven on earth. I mean, take your dirty clothes off your body, drop them in the washing machine and then take your shower. Genius.

I have a"laundry/storage" room in the basement, and I feel less than happy going there to do laundry. It's the chore I like the least, so it makes sense that I'd prefer to have it in a happier location. Don't know about the kitchen, but this definitely has me thinking about sacrificing the linen closet in my upstairs bathroom for a stackable unit, if feasible. The shorter distance for folding and putting items away would go a long way to shortening my laundry routine from its current week long period (1 -2 days to wash, 5 to finally put away)!

""Any time you transfer underwear from the washer to the dryer, you’re getting E. coli on your hands. Just one soiled undergarment can spread bacteria to the whole load and machine."

Huh?
Wouldn't it be CLEAN by the time you're transferring from washer to dryer?

And why would someone put any clothes (much less dirty underwear) on a kitchen counter? I never did that when I had a laundry closet in the kitchen...
...at most, we used the kitchen table for folding clean clothes.

I would love to have a washer & dryer or a combo unit in my kitchen. Having to go down 2 flights of stairs to do laundry (and then haul it back up again) is wearing thin after 10 years.

I have to agree with questioning the Today Show Health segment's logic on transfer e.coli between the washer and the dryer (I regularly question their logic about most things - they tend to be as annoyingly inaccurate as most local news). If the undergarment is still soiled after it's been washed, it gets tossed, not put in the dryer, anyways.

I think the bit on e. coli has to do with "hidden germs" --- even if it looks clean, the clothes could still be ridden with bacteria if the temperature of the water did not get high enough to kill it. I think many of us are washing with cold water these days, and unless you use bleach, well, there are probably plenty of yuckies still floating around in the water post cycle. Not to mention that front loaders don't use much water to begin with so it would be more concentrated in those machines. But that said, probably more an issue for those with kids, especially little ones.

The ideal for new home design is a laundry area/room near the bedrooms, where the clothes would be stored. That's not possible for apartments or older homes, not without significant remodeling. Kitchen laundry setups are usually a cost effective solution. I grew up in homes both here and in Europe with them, seems normal too me.

@ mjs7640, I'm astonished the hundreds of millions of us Europeans have survived the dicing with death that is having a washing machine in our kitchens. It's a miracle!

After finding pipes in the wall (thanks to a flood from above) I'll be creating a new kitchen and turning the current old kitchenette into a laundry closet. A huge bonus for my lil' NYC studio.
Still not sure if I want stackable, side-by-side or even an all-in-one machine. I sure hope there are some smaller models to choose from - lately the machines all seem to be enormous!

I’m French and even though new houses tend to have separate laundry rooms or closets, here the norm is actually to have your washing machine either in the kitchen or in the basement (except in really big houses but unfortunately real estate is really expensive). We’ve had ours in the basement for years but it wasn’t very convenient and due to a flood a few years ago we had to move it to the bathroom upstairs. It’s not a very good solution either because, well, everyone knows what happens when water and electricity collide. But it’s a 1900 or so old house (there wasn’t even a bathroom when it was built) so we do what we can.

On another topic, I’m amazed at how many people commented about their dryers. I don’t really understand why everybody needs one. I mean, we don’t have one and we’re perfectly fine. We’re just 2, my mom and I, but even when we were 3, we never had a problem. I’m not saying that it’s wrong and you should all be hanged or whatever but on a site that advocates ecology and sustainability (how many posts here and at re-nest talk about saving energy and doing the right thing for the planet) it just seems weird. I’m in charge of the laundry and I can tell you, taking a half hour after the washing is done to hang the clothes to make them dry naturally without wasting energy, electricity, it’s really simple and easy. You don’t need that much space and who cares if one day a week you have a rack in your living room or in your bathroom? In spring and summer I hang the clothes outdoors and in 3 hours they’re dry; in winter (as it’s the case now) it takes about a day and a night but frankly, it’s no big deal. Plus, it smells really good in the house.

Lastly (and I’ll stop with this), a lot of people commented about the fact that they don’t have space for storing the laundry but I think the real problem is how many times a week do you do your laundry? I think people tend to wash things all the time, things that aren’t even dirty. I know a lot of people like that, even in my own family. If we all stopped being germ-freaks, I think that would be a progress.

Yep, I lived in the UK for a while and the washing machine was always in the kitchen. Dryers were rare. It was strange at first but after a while it wasn't a big deal.

My parents house has the washer and dryer (they're stacked) in the kitchen area, it is a custom kitchen set up but it is a long cabinet with a tile top where my mom does the folding, and one of the drawers pulls out to reveal..an ironing board! genius! My mom wanted to be able to multitask and be able to cook and do laundry at the same time. But wait, it gets better. the breakfast bar has a little nook that accomodates two laundry baskets.

Having the W/D in kitchen beats having to go down to our damp and nasty Freddy Krueger basement to do laundry!

I had toyed with the notion of installing one of those curved shower racks from the ceiling and hanging some drapery to obscure the appliances, but the washer and dryer really aren't that intrusive in our large kitchen.
Though I like the idea of stacking the washer and dryer...whenever ours crap out and we have to get new units, I'll definitely consider stacking units!

Forget the washer and dryer, I need one of those cute shaggy spaniels in my kitchen.

When we lived in the US I remember once finding mice in the bottom of the shared apartment washer. Getting back to a nice undercounter front loader in the UK was a luxury.
Frankly I don't understand the germs argument - the pile of washing comes into the kitchen, is loaded from the hamper to the machine, washes overnight when electricity is cheap, gets taken out to dry. Doesn't once touch any surface.
I also have a front loading dryer in my current kitchen but probably only use it about twice a year - it's not going to stay much longer.