Paint Your Fuse Box So It Blends In, step by step

Our freshly painted laundry room is so bright and glad that makes me want to sing and dance like a crazy person. First I repainted all the trim (with Olympic No-VOC semi-gloss off-the-shelf white) and painted the annoying brown quarter round near the baseboards, so it blended in with the white trim. I applied three thin coats of the same Olympic No-VOC paint (no primer because I used the same method with success in the living room five months back and I am lazy). Then when it came to the wall color, we chose to use the leftover paint that we used in the adjoining kitchen (remember when we painted that beastly paneling here?). Why that color? To brighten things up and connect the two spaces since you fairly much see the kitchen as soon as you step in the side door in the laundry room.

Since the laundry room is such a small space we knew a distinct color might interrupt the flow and make it feel a lot smaller than something that would connect slash elongate it. We might add a subtle stencil or some other paint treatment down the line if we want more mojo in there – but once we hang window treatments and a new dangly light fixture and add plenty of other stuff (art, storage, etc) we are not sure if it’ll be too much for the compact room. So we are waiting on the whole stencil/stripe possibility.

Bee tee dubs (yes I simply spelled out btw, and turned the w into a dubs) the color is called Sesame 381 by Benjamin Moore (color matched to Olympic’s No-VOC paint in a semi-gloss finish). Our small semi-light-filled laundry room has a door and window that let in light from the carport, which is not especially bright but it is a lot brighter than our windowless kitchen. So the artichoke-ish grellow (green + yellow) tone:

1. is a smidge brighter
2. reads a little more yellow than it does in the kitchen
3. is so insanely cheerful

We are psyched. Who does not enjoy a glad little laundry nook? As soon as I began cutting in I knew it would wake up the whole space.

Here is what it looked like when we moved in:

And here she is now with a slap of how-you-doin’-on-this-fine-morning color (along with some other changes covered here):

Oh and if you are wondering what that white board is in the pic above and below, we heard setting stacked appliances on a pleasant thick piece of plywood that goes against all three walls can stabilize the machine for a longer life. So we did it. And I painted it white because when we add shelving to that side of the nook it’ll blend in like chin hair on a mountain goat. Made that up. Think it is catchy? Nah, me neither.

Some of these photos look a little more neon and booger-ish than it does in real life. In real life there is zero booger resemblance and it is certainly not neon. Which is a relief. It is light and sweet – like liquid sunshine. And here is why we knew this room could handle some glad color:

• We will add a ton of white shelving to temper the color (along with the white washer/dryer).
• It has a window & a glass door as well as a doorway into the kitchen to break things up.
• Eventually when we have wood floors in there it’ll be even more subdued.

Oh and as for that crazy metal fuse box cover that we had going on – remember this?

We simply rolled/brushed a few thin and even coats of paint right over it. Did not even prime. We did that in our last house to hide a simply-as-obvious one in the corner of the den – and four years later it still looked excellent. See if you can find it here. Metal in fact takes thin coats of paint truly well (like spray paint) so by being sure not to glob it on and opting to do more thin coats (as opposed to fewer thick and globby ones) I got some pleasant coverage. And it still opens and closes easily (pointer: do that a few times between coats to ensure that things still work smoothly and nothing gets gummed up with paint). In short: thin and even applications = the painting holy grail.

Total spent for this phase of the makeover: $0 (thanks to trim and wall paint that we already had leftover from the kitchen). Wait, we did buy a pack of rollers so it was in fact $8. Of course we still have plans for adding a ton of function (and a good dose of looks-pleasant stuff, like art) to the room – and that blank wall in particular. So that painted fuse box will not simply sit there looking, well, painted. We will share those details as we go.

As for the to do list, here it is as it stands today:

• Paint the odd brown quarter round near the baseboards glossy white
  
• Redo all the dinged up trim (also in semi-gloss white)
• Paint the walls
• Replace our dryer hose with a safer all-metal one
• Add adjustable built-in shelving in that nook next to the stacked washer & dryer <– we cannot unstack them and put them on the long wall since the room is only 3.5′ wide so the doors would not even open
• Replace the hinges and knobs on the upper cabinetry
• Get a new light fixture <- Hands-on something? perhaps a small chandelier?
• Add a window treatment (perhaps a homemade one?)
• Add other functional storage near the door for shoes, Burger’s leash, etc
• Hang some art to keep it cheerful and obscure the giant metal fuse box

Mmm, crisp white trim might also be the painting holy grail. Does not it look so strong with warm greeny gold? This photo is likely the most true to life when it comes to the actual paint color and how it looks in there. It is a little lighter in person, but this is the yellow with a hint of green tone to a T. It is simply like an artichoke heart.

Suddenly I in fact feel like doing laundry. Weird.

Psst- You folks were all so sweet about my haircut yesterday. Seriously, I nearly got a cavity. And I certainly got all awkward and clammy and blushy. In short the opposite of cute. Anyway, rest assured that my hair will never look that good again (you know stylists possess some other-worldly powers to create a hairstyle that no one can replicate at home). So stop being so dang pleasant. It is making me rashy.