Mud Room

Between the garage and the kitchen is a small hall, a mud room, which connects the garage with the rest of the home. Tile is on the floor to catch dirt before a person enters the home proper.

However, just inside the doorway, there is a small, but lovely, mosaic of a butterfly. This is the doorway that will be used to bring groceries, and other items for the home, into the house.

This is the view from the garage, through the mudroom, into the manor. The beams in the picture are in the kitchen. The door from the garage will be the ideal entrance to take in groceries, as the pantry is just to the right. Also, when one is working in the yard or garage and finds the need to use the "necessary" room, this door can be taken for the closest half bath. "First door to the left, please." No messing up the manor proper.

This mudroom is small, but you can get to a lot from here. On the south wall you'll find the pantry, a "cove" where a seat can be placed, and the dumbwaiter.

There are two doors to the north. One door leads to the small half bath the designer calls the "Dog Bath". This is hidden by another lovely antique door. This little bath was put here to be convenient for someone working in the garage or yard or is handy from the kitchen. A tiny bath tucked away until needed. But, when needed, it can be used without tracking dirt through the rest of the home. It's also convenient for the chef's when they need it. Neat!

The other door goes to the utility room. Again, this makes it very convenient for putting items away that you have purchased and want stored on the many shelves located in this room. This is great storage for those things you have that you never know what to do with.

The doorway to the east leads to the kitchen. Again, convenient. The pantry sits between the garage and the kitchen. It's only a few steps from the car to put groceries up and only a few steps to get them from the pantry to the kitchen when they will be used. The picture on the right shows the cove with a hall tree inside. This small cove was designed so a bench, or, like the owner has done, a lovely small hall tree, could be placed here. This makes a great place for removing, or putting on, your shoes or boots. The woodwork around this alcove is specially designed to make this tiny area stand out. It is truly a beautiful piece of art.

This is a very busy, very useful, little mudroom. There are two more items in this area of interest.

There is a special designed, hand made roll top door that looks like something that came out of the old houses in the movies. And, upon opening it, you find it is the dumb waiter. Well-situated, this is handy for so many things. Again, as you bring things in from shopping, you can use the dumb waiter to send items to different floors. Much better than running up and down stairs.

Also, there will be times you will want a snack, or even a meal, on a different floor. Being just off the kitchen makes it so easy to get your midnight dessert up to the top floor so you can enjoy it on the balcony while watching the sun set or the moon dancing on the lake. It's also a great laundry chute for sending dirty clothes down. And, being close to the laundry, it's easy to acquire the dirty clothes when doing laundry, and to then send the clean back home again.

What a great idea to put something so useful in the home. And, what an impressive idea to embellish it with a lovely roll top door. It speaks to you of old mystery movies and the dumb waiters in the old mansions they used to grace.

The last item in this hall is another, very much smaller, roll top door. Inside is a tiny recessed area with an electrical outlet. What is it for? Again, convenience. It's designed to hold, and charge, your cell phone. When you enter the home, you can place the phone there to let it charge. Then, upon leaving, your phone is charged and handy to pick up on your way out. Genius!