How to Add a DIY Laundry Chute

July 26, 2012

How to add a DIY laundry chute in your home!

During our basement finishing process, we decided to move the washer and dryer from our main level in our tiny entry/mud room, to the basement.

I knew for it to function really well for our family, we'd need a laundry chute from upstairs to the basement. 

I know, some people think I’m a little crazy for moving our laundry to the basement. But let me tell you, I am counting down the DAYS till it gets moved down there. It will be the best. day. ever.

One thing I wanted to do if we were moving the washer and dryer down a level was to install a clothes chute -- we made that part of the “finishing plan.” Laundry chutes are kind of like basements for me – I just think they are the coolest

 My grandparents had one growing up, and I always marveled at it. Even as a child, I realized how brilliant it was! 

At first I thought there was no way we could do one in our house, but when we decided to finish the basement, I started to really think about where we could put one.

I did some sleuthing for a few weeks to figure out where we would have an unobstructed path. I did a lot of walking up and down the steps, taking measurements and figuring out where the best place would be. 

If you have your original builder plans or blueprints, those will be helpful!

At first I thought we could put a chute down from the floor in our master closet. Then it was the upstairs bathroom linen closet, but I realized a while later that I was waaay off in my measurements.

The final idea came to me because a former decorating client of mine did just the same thing – she had a chute installed in the bottom of a bathroom vanity.

We figured out we could do the same! It worked out perfectly because there were zero obstacles between there and the basement (we THOUGHT!).

The start of our laundry chute is at the very right, in the vanity in our bathroom:

maple bathroom cabinets

I didn’t get a pic of the inside because I ran out of daylight and our bathroom has horrible lighting. Anyway, that’s where it starts.

We double checked my theory by cutting a small exploratory hole in a ceiling below to check for obstructions. It worked so well -- no floor joists or heating ducts to deal with! 

Now I thought about doing this myself, but I’ve never cut through floors before (egads!) and didn’t have the tools to do so. 

I was also scared to death of cutting into something major, like electrical, plumbing, whatever.

Our contractors we use occasionally were all into it and then came up with a brilliant plan to make it happen.

Instead of framing out a chute and then building it up with walls (that would have to be ultra smooth – metal or sheeting or laminate, but nothing that has any rough edges so it would grab clothes) they were going to use PVC pipe.

We were able to run it downstairs through our powder room linen closet, to the basement.

The PVC wasn't cheap, so we paid a bit more in materials, but a lot less in labor. 

We ran into a snag going down the bathroom floor when we found a water pipe. But the guys came up with a solution using an angled PVC portion to turn the direction just a bit. 

It was only a few inches over but it was PERFECT:

DIY laundry chute 

laundry chute pvc pipe

You can see that they were able to rebuild the shelving in there (done the same way I built the new shelves for the pantry) so I am still able to get necessities into that closet:

pvc pipe laundry chute 

DIY laundry chute with PVC pipe

I did a bit of a purge, so even though I lost about half of the storage, I still only had to move a couple baskets down to the basement. And eventually we’ll have mud room storage, so I’ll be able to use that if I want to keep the stuff upstairs.

I still need to fill holes in the closet walls (from the old wire shelves), paint the wood shelves, and I may even paint the pipe. I wonder if paint would stick? How funny would it be to make it a fun color or something?

I think it is hilarious when I open this door now and see this huge sewer pipe. HILARIOUS. It just make me giggle. 

It ends in the basement bedroom ceiling and the guys made a little box with a laundry chute door:

I’ll fill the holes, caulk and paint it and you won’t even notice it!

They used latches to keep the door secure:

And it works! The pipe is wide enough I can send towels or even throw rugs down no problem. 

We keep a large laundry basket in that corner so everything lands in there. 

The great thing is the inside is a smooth as a babes bottom, so dirty clothes sail right through, even with the little angle. No sharp edges for anything to get caught on!

There’s a few things I wanted to add, just for safety reasons. 

  • Some areas have strict fire codes when it comes to laundry chutes. The concern is, if a fire started in the basement, the smoke would have a straight shot upstairs. But from my research online and after talking to MANY experts, that is not a concern if you have entrances shut with doors. (As many point out, staircases do the same.) 
  • To be safe, you can use a fire safe metal door to go in the basement (instead of the wood door). 
  • If you have small children, there’s things to think about, obviously. I’ve heard some stories about things, pets and people (??) heading down chutes! 
  • Our son is too big to fit in this of course, and he’s just not the type that would try to actually go down the thing. But just to be safe (with smaller kids in the house occasionally) I plan to put a child lock on that bathroom vanity door. 

I cannot tell you how WICKED COOL this thing is!! We are just tickled by it. :) It’s got me soooo ready to get that laundry room going – so hopefully I’ll have more to share on that soon!!

So did you have a laundry chute growing up? Or have one now? Any fun stories to tell? :)  


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Comments

  1. First of all: REN AND STIMPY! HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY! lol.

    Second of all: That is the coolest thing ever! I've never lived in a house with more than one level so obviously I'm not privvy to laundry chutes.

    I would clog it easily. I'd try to shove a huge wad of towels in there or something equally stupid. :)

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  2. Love the idea of a laundry chute! I've never had one, but always thought they were way cool! And before you ever said anything, as soon as I saw the pipe in the powder room, I thought "hrmm, I bet she'll paint that!" LOL. Hope you get your washer and dryer downstairs soon so you can really try it out! :)

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  3. I love the idea of using PVC pipe. So super smart. Ryan put one in our current house and it's awesome. But it's made of metal flashing and there have been times that clothes have gotten stuck on the seams. But it's been such a lifesaver and a good compromise since I really didn't want basement laundry. It worked out that when they ran the ductwork for central air and heat, it looked uneven in te living room. So Ryan frames in the other side with a laundry chute,which goes from the upstairs linen closet down through the living room and right to the laundry area in the basement. In between the two areas of ductwork, we built a built-in media center. Now it all looks like it was meant to be.

    I'm still trying to figure out how to install an elevator to get the clean clothes back up the stairs. Any ideas?

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    1. Hi Kim, you could always run a bucket and pulley system from the opening on the second floor, where the bucket fits loosely into the PVC pipe.

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  4. Cool! I love laundry shoots. I've never had one, but wish I did. Our washer and dryer are in the basement. At least we live in a bungalow so I only have one flight of stairs to go up and down.

    Someone already commented Ren & Stimpy. : ( I LOVE that show, still! Ren's beady little eye bulging out of his head while he screams, "Stimpy, you iiidiooot!!" Ahh, memories. hahaha =)

    ~ Catie

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  6. We had one growing up---from the first floor bathroom on down to the basement, which meant we had to bring our dirties down one level before partaking in the fun! Our house now has one that goes from the 2nd story, has a door on the first floor and lands in the basement. Ours is made from furnace ductwork, so it too is smooth and everything slides right down. You know it's time to do laundry when you open the door on the first floor and jeans and towels are staring you down!

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  7. I share your fascination with laundry chutes. I was so envious as a child of friends who's houses had them. We DID make them a part of our play though just so you know. Got stuck a few times....

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  8. Holy moly! That is SO cool! I've never had a laundry shoot, but I think it would completely awesome to have one! I always thought the secret passage ways and dumb waiter on the show "Webster" were so neat. Would love a house like that!

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  9. My friend had one... and I did go down it. It was super fun!

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  10. LOVE this!!! I think you should put a wooden frame up around the pipe, I think it would look better than the open pipe in the closet. This is a great idea and it will be sooo awesome for you!!

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  11. My sister had one when I was younger. She also had a pool table in the basement. When people would go to the bathroom, we use to take the pool cues and knock the chute door open in the bathroom...imagine everyone's surprise! We use to scare the heck out of them.

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  12. The laundry chute my aunt has is in a linen closet between shelving units. The opening is about waist high and it has a hinged lid. It was our favorite spot for hide and seek. It was so big that 4 kids could stand on the lid. I can't believe none of us ever jumped down it. It was only one floor down, and opened from the side at the bottom with cabinet doors.

    My last house had a laundry chute that was the smallest I've ever seen. You put the clothes in a slot in the wall that was probably 3" x 10". I had to actually feed the clothes into it one pant leg or one sleeve at a time and shake them to make sure they didn't ball up or they wouldn't make it. I kept a broom handy in the laundry room and dislodged clothes with it often.

    I love the location of yours and the PVC!

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  13. Wow, this is so cool! And I love the door at the end.

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  14. What a fun and useful idea.
    We had a laundry shoot in our house growing up that went from the upstairs hall to the familyroom below. Why it emptied to the family room I'll never know.
    I loved to set in the shoot and spy on my brothers and their dates. Sometimes I'd smuggle the extra TV remote in there with me and change the channel or mess with the volume while they were trying to watch a movie.
    I even freaked my aunt out by setting in there and making strange noises while she was trying to sleep in the bedroom next to the laundry shoot. It was also a quick exit from the upstairs to the mainfloor when I was being chased by my brothers who were too big to fit through it.
    I guess you could say I was a tease.

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  15. I grew up in a house that had the basement laundry room directly below the kitchen. My resourceful Mom sawed a hole under the kitchen sink (a shock if you opened the cabinet looking for dish soap and were instead confronted with the gates of hell!) Dirty clothes dropped down into a big old laundry tray (sink). I admit we did squeeze down the chute more than once--there had to be somebody below to catch you in case you lost your grip on the edge! It was one of the coolest thing about that big old house...

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  16. Ooooooh is it wrong to covet another woman's laundry chute? Brilliant! Rachael @ Frugal Faye

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  17. Very cool chute! I'm impressed. You should be able to paint the pipe, you'll just need a good plastic primer first. I'd extend the chute down just because I wouldn't want to reach up that high to get clothes out. The fire safe door on the end might be a good idea given that the laundry room is a more likely place for a fire to start. Good luck! I can't tell you how jealous I am at how fast your basement is coming along! We're doing ours completely on our own and have been working on it for two years now!

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  18. Uh, my siblings and I TOTALLY went down our laundry shoot. We'd hide in it during hide and seek games, too, and our friends would never find us! Ours was big and square though and only went down 1 floor and landed on a counter, so it wasn't terribly dangerous. I think it was more dangerous when we put my brother in the dryer and started it...

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  19. We has a laundry chute in our bathroom vanity growing up! It went straight down into the workshop (next to the laundry room). It was just a cheap plastic garbage can with the bottom cut off!

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  20. We LOVE our laundry chute. Best invention ever! Watch out for towels though they get hung up in ours. Ours is framed in behind one of our bathroom cabinets. The PVC might make laundry slide better, ours is wood.

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  21. I'm with the other chick who thinks you should put a box around the pipe in the closet. It looks a little sewer-pipe-ish. :) I am SO going to look into getting a chute for my home! It does sound delightful!

    -Jen

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  22. We renovated our last house and included a laundry chute. They are so handy and fun. Just like I like dutch doors, it's hard to explain why, they're just cool.

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  23. When my house was re-built (after a fire) the previous owner decided to move the washer & dryer UP from the basement because the steps going down there are pretty narrow as the house is 115 years old and you really couldn't get back up the stairs easily with a laundry basket in hand. Now the washer & dryer are in the back of the kitchen and I hate seeing them. The kitchen is also an add on to the back of the house so there is no connection to the second floor. My solution is to throw laundry from the hamper down the steps and then gather it up for washing. I surely do envy your laundry shoot!

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  24. We had a laundry shoot in the house I grew up in. The "stuff door" was in the hallway just outside the bathroom - so handy - and it ended in the laundry closet that was located behind bi-fold doors in the kitchen (awful).

    It was long and narrow, definitely couldn't get a person (or really even a body part) in it, and we never tried. I remember using the yardstick and least once a week to shove everything down. We used to send our Barbies down "the slide" and catch them on the other side. Kept us entertained for hours.

    My parents eventually renovated the kitchen, took out the closet and moved everything down to the basement for laundry. My mom tried to work with the construction crew to re-route the laundry shoot down another storey, but couldn't do it. She was so bummed, I think she may have cried.

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  25. I love laundry chutes! We had one growing up so naturally, when my husband and I purchased our first home I was excited to see the laundry chute in the bathroom. Much to my surprise, after I dropped a bunch of towels, etc in it, I couldn't find the "opening" in the basement. Well, wouldn't you know it, the previous family didn't share my love of laundry chutes and had closed it up when they put in the basement ceiling! Some day I will cut a hole in my basement ceiling a retrieve my towels! (Yes, we've lived here 11 yrs) Enjoy your new chute!!

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  26. That is so cool! MY grandparetns had one and my sister and I used to stick barbies down it! It entertained us for hours. Until one would get stuck and my grandma would come running in with a broom scolding us :) oh the memories!

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  27. So totally awesome! We live in a one story and I would love something that would get the clothes from the bathroom to the laundry room.

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  28. Yay! Paint it a fun color, you should totally do it! We had a laundry chute growing up, we loved it except that it was original to the house (circa 1912) so it was not smooth inside and things, mostly my teenage bras were always getting stuck:)

    Now we just put the laundry room on the bedroom floor so I only have to carry kitchen towels upstairs, everything else is on the same floor.

    Jessica

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  29. We have one in our 2 story with laundry in the basement. I love it,makes laundry a lot easier. I just wish we could have a vacuum tube like at the banks to take it back up! Enjoy it.

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  30. My grandmother's house had a little foot-high door in the kitchen on the right side of the basement stairway. When you opened it, you could look down into the basement laundry area. She kept a folding fabric laundry basket on wheels positioned under the door. It was such fun to throw things through the little door and then run down the stairs and retrieve them out of the basket.

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  31. LOVE LOVE LOVE my laundry chute (although I DO wish it worked both ways!!). I have two openings, one in the upstairs bath & one in my kitchen. SO convenient!
    I have to say, my kids & their friends have been entertained for HOURS with it. I would think twice about locking up that door - especially if little people can't fit (like mine). It's such a silly thing, but so much fun to drop stuff & have a friend trying to catch it on the other end (or in the middle in my case)!
    Enjoy your chute!!

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  32. My grandparents had one in the hallway where the bedrooms & bathroom were. I always thought it was the neatest thing!!! We had a basement growing up but no chute - and I hated carrying those baskets down from my room on the second floor all the way to the basement. And now I live in TX, land of no basements. I don't even have a second story so no stairs, just lugging laundry all over the house. I live your chute. Congrats!

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  33. you could make it go all the way down and make it like it is a clothes closet. ang

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  34. I had one growing up, it was neat, but I hated going to the basement for laundry.

    One year, my easter basket was hidden in the chute(when I was like, 12). They hung it from a string from the upstairs bathroom. The only reason I found it was because there was another opening in the chute on our first floor (by the mudroom) and I opened it and saw a skinny string going down. Awesome hiding place - and it gave my younger brother time to find things without me being in the way.

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  35. Too bad laundry chutes don't bring the clean clothes back upstairs---Carrying the heavy clothes up the stairs is least favorite part! :-P

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  36. We are currently building our dream home and a laundry shoot is a must. We have our laundry room on our main floor and just above it is our master bath so, just like you, the shoot will go in the bottom of the vanity but will only have to drop one floor. With 5 kids worth of laundry to carry, I look forward to just dropping it all in the laundry room rather than carrying it down the stairs. I love the sewer pipe idea! So resourceful!

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  37. Loved that Ren & Stempy...ahhhh, the early days of Nick at Night.

    I was a house-sitter for 4 years and lived in a beautiful historic home. It had a laundry chute that actually was accessible from 3 floors and went all the way to the basement. It was awesome. They also had 2 washer/dryer sets, so doing laundry was super-fast, like being at a laundry mat, but without the creepers!

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  38. My grandmas house is 100+ years old and it has a laundry chute. My brothers and cousins and I would toss toys down it and try and catch them at each of the levels going down. Once my cousin stuck her head in the door of the chute at the middle level and got stuck. They had to grease her neck to get her out!!

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  39. That's such a cool idea. No house I've ever lived in has had one and our home now is just one story but maybe one day.

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  40. We have a laundry chute in the hall outside the bathroom in our 1920s home. I grew up in an old 2 story farmhouse where our laundry was in the dungeon of a basement and we had to drag baskets of clothes down 2 flights of stairs to be washed. If I were to build a home and the laundry worked best in the basement, I might think about building a dumbwaiter next to the laundry chute, then we could just send the clean laundry back up. =) It's an idea anyway.

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  41. So awesome! Our old house had a laundry shoot that was built into the house. That is the one thing my kids miss about the old house. Our new house has the laundry on the second floor, which is a bonus, but that old laundry shoot was a great place to throw balls and matchbox cars down!

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  42. My brother and I always tried to put the dogs down the laundry chute but they always gave too big a fight---thank goodness!!

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  43. My parents' house has a laundry chute that goes from the 3rd floor down to the basement! My dad built it and it was plywood inside so my mom's pantyhose often got caught! It starts just outside the 3rd floor master bedroom. On the 2nd floor it started as a hole in the bathroom floor (story to follow!) and he built the wall out around it and put a small door at about waist level to drop the clothes in. On the 1st floor it goes right through a wall and there is also a door in the hall so mom could throw any kitchen/bath towels and such down. In the basement it ends in the laundry room and he built a bottom to the box so the clothes wouldn't just fall onto the floor.
    I remember throwing toys down it all the time (which mom hated!) :) and clothes backing up to the 1st floor opening when mom got behind on washing! :)
    So all of the doors on all 3 floors are now too small for a child to fit down, but before the 2nd floor wall was finished being built out my dad put an old hamper on top of the hole and took out the bottom so we'd lift the hamper lid and the clothes went right down into the chute. I was about 3 at the time and climbed onto the hamper to turn on the light in the bathroom. The hamper slipped out from under me and I plummeted all the way down to the basement! My head must have caught a nail or jagged piece of wood somewhere in there and I ended up splitting my head open and needing a bunch of stitches. Plus our toy throwing antics *literally* came back to bite us in the butt when I landed at the bottom onto a little wind-up snoopy toy and cut my tooshie! :)
    Fun times! :)

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  44. Funny you mention kids going down the chute. When I was a child I put my cat down ours. The poor cat. Don't worry though. He made it out fine. I stuffed him down the chute and my mom happened to be down in the basement doing laundry. She said she was surprised when he came out of the ceiling. Luckily there was a basket at the bottom so he had a soft landing.

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  45. We had one growing up and it was AWESOME!! Except is was all wood with nails sticking into it and one day my cousin decided to go down it...he made it without s scratch! I miss it (so much so that when the '07 tornado took the house I salvaged the door to it..in hopes of using it one day for my own!) Lol!

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  46. I love the idea. I haven't ever lived in a house with a laundry shoot because they've all been single story. I also think it would be cool to install a dumbwaiter so you could send the folded clothes back upstairs easily without having to lug them up the staircase. If I ever get to have a multi level house I will be doing that!

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  47. A couple of houses ago, we had a laundry chute. It was metal flashing and, never once, did anything get stuck. My boys weren't brave enough (back then) to go down it; however, lots of odd toys did make their way through. It began in a storage closet in the Bonus Room on the 2nd floor (obviously) and emptied directly into one of the laundry room cabinets which was great because, with the doors closed, you didn't even see that there were dirty clothes there. I was wondering if where your chute ends, you could place cabinets there which would hide the fact that it was a laundry chute and, perhaps, give you some more storage for other things.

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  48. I just had to post 2 funnies for you from my blog (re: laundry chute): enjoy!

    http://www.hold-the-sugar.blogspot.com/2010/07/good-morning-mommy.html

    http://www.hold-the-sugar.blogspot.com/2010/07/good-afternoon-mommy.html

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  49. We had a laundry chute growing up! And I don't think I could ever have one because my older brother used to think it was funny to drop me down it on laundry day.. Our chute was a door that opened on the main floor into the concrete basement. The oldest would "try" to catch me (I was 3 at the time and I remember all of it) and my other brother would pick me up and drop me.. It wasn't till I missed the pile one day and landed on the hard concrete that my parents finally figured it out and my dad put a lock on it...

    Looks amazing!!!
    Jill

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  50. We had one in a house we lived in once- I think we even had some sort of basket on wheels to catch it all in.

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  51. We had a dumbwaiter in an old Victorian house In New Orleans I lived in as a kid. The pulley system was still in place but the platform had been removed. We used it as a laundry shoot (second floor to first, no basement) and as a way to talk to eachother from different floors. The entire dumbwaiter was essentially a wood box ( with a beautiful stain and decorative moldings) that went straight up both floors, with doors that opened at waist height and up. In another house, built around the twenties, in San Francisco there was a laundry shoot in the floor of the linen closet down to the garage/laundry area- the first floor was garage/ laundry and second floor living area. The problem with this one was that humidty from the laundry machines in the unvented garage area would travel up the shoot and caused mildew in the linen closet. The neighborhood was pretty foggy anyway so it didn't need a lot of humidty to happen.

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  52. We had a laundry chute in a house I lived in as a kid, and it IS way cool! Ours was in the bathroom vanity, and definitely not as safe as yours appears to be (in terms of people diving through it if they so desired). But, that never happened. Some toy cars made their way down, but that's it. ;-)

    I think having the laundry chute is going to be key in making the basement laundry room work (meaning less up and down stairs with baskets full of laundry). Wonderful solution!!

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  53. We have a laundry chute that starts on the floor of our master bath closet & ends in the basement laundry room. The ending location is actually a finished cabinet, so it holds approximately a laundry basket worth of clothes in case I don't get down there right away to sort.

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  54. We've had a laundry shoot in our last two places and love it. It's so nice and convenient. It's so much easier then lugging laundry down the stairs.

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  55. my parents had a chute that ended in a cupboard - with the door closed you couldn't see the piles of dirty laundry (yay!). I remember that if we were pressed for time when cleaning for company, we'd run around the house collect dirty towels/linens and hide 'em in the chute! I also remember having to unstick items, which makes me nervous to use the chute in my current house (from upstairs to basement)

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  56. Growing up, my BFF had a laundry chute in the hall bath - a straight chute into the basement. Needless to say, we OFTEN sneaked out of the house this way while her parents were still awake, then sneaked back in after they were in bed. I had very long hair then and learned to put it up with pins after a very hard lesson, yank, yank, the first time.. Fun times. My BFF died from cancer and I miss her, so this was a great memory for me.

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  57. We have one now. My husband worked HVAC and said they'd often build them in the walls with ductwork, so that's what ours is made of.

    Our opening is in the bathroom that's between our bedrooms. We did make it wider than a wall, though, so it does come a couple of inches into the linen closet that's behind the bathroom. But, as a bonus feature, the door to the laundry chute was big enough to allow access to a couple shelves in the linen closet. Genius! (Since towel storage inside the bathroom before was a hassle.)

    Downstairs, we hung a regular, single door, upper kitchen cabinet to hold the clothes that come down.

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  58. I love your laundry chute! We had one in our old house that looked like yours with the awesome door. Unfortunately, there was an access in the kitchen as well as the second floor. The unfortunate part is when I opened it, I never knew what was going to fall out. So, the door was removed until we moved. Thanks for triggering all my happy chute memories because there are plenty of them.

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  59. In most states, building codes now forbid the inclusion of laundry chutes. They are a conduit that can allow flames and intense heat to quickly penetrate various layers of a house.

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  60. This is such an innovate way to make a laundry chute - love it! I had one in the house I grew up in (a split level), but for some reason we never used it. It was on the floor of the closet in my brother's room and went straight to the basement but anything dropped down there would have landed on top of the furnace. Fire hazard anyone?

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  61. our first house (built in 1927) had a laundry chute. I loved it! not having dirty clothes pile up is so nice.

    and talk about safety, my in laws just have a hole in the floor. and not a small one...

    love the ren &stimpy ref.

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  62. We have one in our house. It runs from our second floor bath to the basement. In our basement, it's just an open pipe and I have a very large rubbermade container there to catch the clothes.

    I have clogged it a couple of times with too big of an armful of laundry - live and learn.

    But the best/scariest thing that my kids have done to me is when my son put his fake, hairy tarantula down the chute so as I was picking out dirty laundry, it fell onto my forearm and almost took me to heaven on the fast train. LOL

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  63. That is cool...I won't be showing it to my husband though! He thinks a laundry chute is a necessity in our new house. Of course it would have to be in MY craft room upstairs because it is over the laundry room! :P

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  64. LOVE IT! And I agree that it could be fun to paint the pipe a bright color in your closet. I'm seeing a bright sunshine yellow. A little Zinsser bonding primer ought to make it work. Be sure to show us :)

    PS -- You have a laundry chute. OMG. So cool!

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  65. I had one growing up and I LOVED it!! When we would play hide and go seek, one of use would always end up hiding in the laundry chute cabinet (the clothes would pile up in a cabinet if it was closed). When we bought our house a couple of years ago, the inspector said, "Oh, and you have a laundry shoot in your bathroom."

    That pretty much sealed the deal :)

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  66. You might want to label that pipe in the closet, some future homeowner is going to be very confused. :)

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  67. We has one growing up and loved it! Can I make a suggestiOn though? Our shoot landed into a cabinet. This allowed the wt of the tossed laundry to sit in the cabinet waiting for laundry day and not on the door waiting to cascade down when you open it. Plus it looked a lot nicer as a cabinet and not a hatch in the ceiling. Then the other side of the can hold various laundry necessities as well. Love it!!

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  68. We has one growing up and loved it! Can I make a suggestiOn though? Our shoot landed into a cabinet. This allowed the wt of the tossed laundry to sit in the cabinet waiting for laundry day and not on the door waiting to cascade down when you open it. Plus it looked a lot nicer as a cabinet and not a hatch in the ceiling. Then the other side of the can hold various laundry necessities as well. Love it!!

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  69. I grew up with a laundry chute on the second story of our house. It went all the way to the laundry in the basement. All of the clothes would come out into a great BIG old utility sink that was not used as a sink. Oh how I wish I had one now! I use to put stuffed animals down it, and then run to get them and do it again. My mom, who grew up in the house, actually remembered putting her cat down it (yikes!) - who did survive unharmed, but was likely not a big fan of the experience. Enjoy your chute!

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  70. I have had 3 homes with laundry chutes and the one I live in now does not. :( It is the thing I miss most! My first home had a chute door opening on the 2nd floor as well as the first. My mom made a canvas bag that attached to the end of the chute in the basement. It had a drawstring on it so the clothes would end in the bag and not on the floor (which sometimes got wet...leaky basement!) We built our 2nd house and I insisted on putting one in ~ viewed it as a necessity! Both homes' chutes were too small for a child, but I did send hangars down the chute to the basement when my mom needed them for ironing! Toys were a frequent visitor, as well! Had to use a yardstick from time to time to push items down when we tried to feed too much through it. We also used it as a handy communication tube from one floor to the next! We moved to another state and the house we bought had a laundry chute that went from the 2nd floor to the main floor laundry room. You could access it from the corner of our bedroom closet OR from a door in the hallway on the wall adjacent to our closet. This was nice as I could access it from our room or my 3 kids could use in the hallway without coming in our bedroom. My oldest daughter tried going down this one once...fun memory for her but not repeated. That chute ended in a corner cabinet that was painted and had 2 sides that were similar to pegboard so that they were vented in case the laundry was damp. I highly recommend the venting! Cuts down on the damp laundry smell if you don't do laundry every day. I loved opening the hatch and having the laundry land on the counter top. The PVC piping is a great idea!

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  71. We have a laundry chute, and it's the most awesome thing ever. It actually has an opening on the top floor in the hallway (for the bedrooms) and then an opening on the main floor (for kitchen towels and such), and then comes out in the laundry room in the basement.

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  72. We had one in our first house, from when I was 6 or 7 until I was 12. It ran from the hall linen cabinet [drawers on the bottom, cupboard up top with the chute hole right there] to the basement [with no stop on the 1st floor]. And yes once the cat almost fell down our chute, but saved himself by placing his claws into my face.... Good times!
    I designed this house with one, it will go from the soon to be 2nd master closet in the bonus space off my master bath to the laundry room on the first floor that is just off my kitchen/Butler Pantry/Mudroom. I even bought the laundry room cabinets with a 1/2 corner cabinet in that corner so that there's space to run the chute so that it will not have to go through the cabinet. Someday it will be installed, and I can not wait!
    Congrats on your laundry chute!

    Ang
    SoLongFarm.blogspot.com

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  73. We live in a home with a non functioning laundry chute. *sad* It's there, mocking me, but the part in the basement has been boarded up and I'm not sure why. If it weren't a rental home I would have torn into it by now. My BFF has a laundry chute in her house and I love sending my towel down. That has been my only experience with a laundry chute. Sad but true. LOVE the PVC idea though!

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  74. We had one growing up that we went down many times. We have one now, but only the cat has been sent down. (By a babysitter, not my kids)

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  75. This is a good example of space saving. I order to the pipe these cabinet is the answer that we use as storage for our necessities. Using laundry chute is very convenience. We can save time and energy to up and down stairs.

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  76. We have a chute behind our bedroom door straight to the basket down by the washing machine and I love it! Looks nice and it's out of the way!

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  77. Wonder where the opening of the chute is? you didn't show the picture of where the top of the chute is.

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  78. Well, how cool is that??!! We didn't have a laundry shoot growing up, but my friend did and we wore ourselves out sending Barbie and Ken down the "Alpine Slide" 1,298 times a day Ü I know exact what kind of pipe you used. My Dad used that to make these ginormous columms for our front entry way porch. Rubbed some fingernail polish remover on the black words of the pipe and you'd never know we had PVC pipe as our elaborate front porch columns.

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  79. I never had one growing up , but my grandparents did. I thought it was so cool! When we moved into our house two years ago I thought for sure it would have one since it was built in 1959. No luck, or so we thought. I was having my husband clear out the cabinets in the bathroom and pull up the icky vinyl flooring that had used as shelf liner. Low and behold there was a hidden laundry shoot! Yay! It has been extremely convenient and all three of my boys - 5, 3 & 2 - love to put there clothes down. I rarely have to collect laundry from baskets. Everything is waiting for me a few feet from the washer. I do however find random toys and rolls of toilet paper on occasion. :)

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  80. LOVE the laundry chute! I had one growing up and I know it was a life saver for my mom!! Awesome!!

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  81. Small pets sometimes make their way down laundry chutes. Be sure to have a conversation regarding your kitty.

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  82. Hip hip hurray for the laundry chute! When we bought our house last year I was TRILLED to find that someone at one point in time gave up a kitchen cabinet to turn it into a laundry chute. When we refaced the kitchen we made it a bit smaller by adding a drawer about and it still needs to be lined in some way, but it is soooo fun to toss the clothes down.
    Enjoy it!!

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  83. Agree that somehow hiding the pipe would be an improvement (i.e. sheet rocking around it so it's a 'corner' in the closet rather than a sewer pipe. Otherwise love the idea !!

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  84. What a Fantastic idea! We want to build one too - what diameter PVC pipe did you use?
    Thanks!

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  85. So awesome, Sarah! I had a laundry shoot in our first little cottage house and loved it, too! Great addition to your home. I think moving to laundry room downstairs is a great idea, especially with the laundry shoot.

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  86. My grandparents had a laundry chute and I thought it was the coolest thing when I was younger! Get your laundry to the basket without even walking downstairs!? Awesome! I've actually considered putting one in my new house, but I'm not sure the logsitics would work. But it's awesome you made it happen!

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  87. I saw your new laundry chute on Apartment Therapy and it's so creative! Looks like it works perfectly and I love how you were able to hide it in the vanity.

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  88. Just read your blog whilst sat in the rain in England. You have done a great job and I am sure it will bring you many years of joy and happiness.
    I wish it was this easy to fit a laundry chute in the UK but our building control have much tighter rules (no plastic allowed, fire doors must be used etc).
    Good job, enjoy the olympics and I look forward to reading more of your interesting blogs.
    Neil @ www.laundrychutes.co.uk
    Manchester, England, UK.
    Laundry Chute youtube video (<90 seconds):
    http://youtu.be/gKKOUmfzFaY

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  89. Awesome!!! When my fiance and I were looking at houses, we saw one that had a laundry chute but we think it was closed because we couldn't find it in the basement.

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  90. You are the second blogger I follow to be adding a laundry chute in!I think it's a great idea and I think you executed it quite well.

    Any concerns about bulky things getting stuck in the bend?

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  91. When we built a house we built a laundry chute into it which had three small doors: one in each of my kid's bedrooms and one from the hallway so we could all throw our laundry down the chute. During construction of the home my daughter did go down the chute but was unhurt, thankfully.
    At my grandparent's home they had a chute for tin cans! It started at the top of their basement staircase and landed into a recycling bin. there were a few small angles and it was wonderful entertainment for us as kids to listen to the tin cans fall down the chute. We would take turns sending cans down or standing at the bottom to see them fall.

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  92. I want one, TOOOO! Do you know how wide the pvc pipe is? I nee to go a distance of three stories, and like the pvc idea.

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  93. Awesome idea... where did you buy your pvc pipe?

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  94. ditto I have a the same question. where do you buy such big size pvc pipes ?

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    1. I'm not sure where they got the pipe -- it was a big warehouse-type place that sold the wider pvc. Wish I could help more!

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  95. What diameter was the PVC pipe? How well does it work? (ie if you were doing it again would you use a larger diameter?)

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    1. Jeff I believe the diameter is 12, maybe 14 inches. It's plenty big -- towels and sheets and blankets go right through.

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  96. Do you happen to remember where your contractors ordered the PVC pipe from? I am working on nearly the exact same thing for my laundry chute, except it needs to curve around a duct like a kiddie tube slide and I am having a hard time finding anywhere with big PVC pipe and fittings in stock. Yours is exactly like what I want to do!!!! Very cool post.

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