Laundry Room Makeover: Built-in Litter Box Cabinet

I cannot stand to see my cats' litter box, but living so close to a major highway really leaves us no choice in keeping them inside. Several years ago when we first got Phoebe and Tobias I found a post about using an Ikea box and hinges to create a litter box container it served us well for a long time, but it was finally time for an upgrade. When we built the house we had the choice to have a countertop in the laundry room, but to my surprise that countertop had to be installed over a drywall base as you can see in the photo.

Another awkward part of the house that I couldn't stand until now. I knew I wanted to use a cabinet that I could cut a hole into for the cats to enter to do their business and I wanted more storage. I shopped around for cabinets for some time and settled on the raw Hampton Bay cabinets at Home Depot. I went with raw to paint because the white was just too white and we already had trim paint from the washer and dryer storage project. After purchasing the base and wall unit, my husband and dad did most of the hard work. Before any install began, I measured the size of the cat hole I wanted in one of the cabinet doors and hubby cut it out. I cleaned up the cut with some shoe moulding around the entire entrance. Then we painted the front face of both cabinets.

Hubby and my dad started the project thinking they would have to remove the entire countertop from the wall and then the drywall piece, but after measuring the height of the cabinets they learned the only thing that needed to be removed was the drywall underneath the countertop because the cabinet would slide right in and serve as any support the countertop may need. Before removing the drywall piece, they removed the baseboards to allow the cabinet to slide all the way back and also tidy up the bottom of the cabinet with that baseboard as a finishing touch.

Then they slid the base unit under the cabinet and added pieces of wood to the sides to cover up the gap in between the wall and cabinet.

The wall unit was much easier because they only had to install it the appropriate height and then add trim on the sides.

After install, I painted the trim and touched up anything that needed it and then I added cabinet hardware.

Now I did mention I was going to put a litter box in the bottom cabinet. Knowing that litter gets everywhere and sometimes the cats somehow miss the box I wanted to ensure that they wouldn't ruin the cabinet with an accident. I got some linoleum flooring cut for the base of the cabinet and made sure to get enough so that I could run it up the sides of the cabinet. I just stapled the linoleum in place and then used some caulk to seal all of the edges so nothing could soak through the seams.

I'm so excited with how this turned out!!!

I'm in love with the progress in this room and can't wait for what's next! I want to cover up all of those chemicals with a shutter.