I grew up in suburban Dublin in Ireland in the 1990s in a house that was built in the mid 1950s.
The laundry room had never been radically changed and was accessed from outside. There was a covered patio area which had a glass canope. You walked out of the kitchen (backdoor) and across the patio and into the laundry room / utility room through an external door.
It was a fairly reasonable sized square room with counter tops and a double sink under the window.
The washer and dryer (old 1980s Siemens machines) where along the other wall under a worktop and there was an extra full height larder freezer too. The gas boiler also sat on the wall on the other side and all the pumps and controls for the central heating system for the house.
The room was big enough and pleasant enough to iron and spend some time in. We had an ironing board, a steam generator iron and an Elna Press on the counter.
The covered area of the patio also had washing lines and there were lines in the utility room too.
It always smelled of detergent and that general nice kind of scent.
The dryer was vented so you always had a waft of scented steam blowing out a vent in the wall in winter too.
The room was definitely designed with washing machines in mind.
I saw the original brochure for the house and one of the selling points was a purpose built laundry room and drying room. It looked to be setup for a 1950s non automatic washer and spin dryer. So I guess there would have been a more laborious laundry day involving a lot of hot water and the sink.
I'd say that house had an automatic washer installed definitely since the 1960s at some stage as the countertops in that room were very much of the 60s era as was the plumbing for the machines
Bear in mind that winters here arent all that cold compared to much if the continental US, so going in and out with laundry wasn't that big a deal.
The laundry room had never been radically changed and was accessed from outside. There was a covered patio area which had a glass canope. You walked out of the kitchen (backdoor) and across the patio and into the laundry room / utility room through an external door.
It was a fairly reasonable sized square room with counter tops and a double sink under the window.
The washer and dryer (old 1980s Siemens machines) where along the other wall under a worktop and there was an extra full height larder freezer too. The gas boiler also sat on the wall on the other side and all the pumps and controls for the central heating system for the house.
The room was big enough and pleasant enough to iron and spend some time in. We had an ironing board, a steam generator iron and an Elna Press on the counter.
The covered area of the patio also had washing lines and there were lines in the utility room too.
It always smelled of detergent and that general nice kind of scent.
The dryer was vented so you always had a waft of scented steam blowing out a vent in the wall in winter too.
The room was definitely designed with washing machines in mind.
I saw the original brochure for the house and one of the selling points was a purpose built laundry room and drying room. It looked to be setup for a 1950s non automatic washer and spin dryer. So I guess there would have been a more laborious laundry day involving a lot of hot water and the sink.
I'd say that house had an automatic washer installed definitely since the 1960s at some stage as the countertops in that room were very much of the 60s era as was the plumbing for the machines
Bear in mind that winters here arent all that cold compared to much if the continental US, so going in and out with laundry wasn't that big a deal.
