Do you feel like Cinderella BP (before prince) when you spend time in your laundry space? Not that you’re using a washboard and tub to clean your unmentionables, but is it dingy and dreary? Or maybe it’s strictly business—sort, treat, clean and fold, all practical and no pretty. We’re here to tell you that it doesn’t have to be that way. Keeping up with the laundry is work enough without feeling like you’ve been chained in a dungeon.

So how do you make the laundry space, (we don’t care whether it’s a room, a closet or a corner of the basement) a happy place? Start with your wardrobe. For this exercise it doesn’t matter whether it’s mostly clean or mostly dirty. We just want to use it for reference. What colors do your favorite outfits have in common? Is there a scarf that you bought because the combo of color and pattern made you want to sing? What jacket do you reach for on a gloomy day?

Now you’ve gained some direction from, of all places, your clothes. Take that scarf or skirt you adore with you to the paint or wallpaper store. They’ll help you translate it into paint colors or a striking wallpaper. The laundry space is the perfect place for high intensity colors and bold patterns to help keep things fun. Unless, of course, your vibe is more soothing and tranquil.

Now on to the practical. Take a look at your current storage. Are the things you need often easy to access? Keep things like detergent and stain treatments close at hand. Organization systems like the Laundry 1-2-3? towers, pedestals and worksurfaces exist to make the job easier. Create separate storage for things you only need occasionally, like extra detergent, out-of-season clothes or the iron. (We hate to tell you this, but you might need to use that little number more often.)

If your laundry area is in a closet, open shelving with baskets or boxes might be the way to go. In a larger space, you might prefer a more closed door policy with cupboards and drawers. Add a small wastebasket for dryer lint as well as crumpled receipts and other assorted junk you fish out of pockets. A pretty bowl or even a bank can hold found money. Make sure you include a place to hang clothes when you take them out of the dryer.

From there on the sky’s the limit. Use magnetic primer under your new paint and create an area to display notes or photos with decorative magnets. Chalkboard paint on cupboard doors can help you label what’s inside or give you a place to write laundry haiku.

Before you know it you’ll be thinking up excuses to spend time in the laundry room. OK, so that may be going a little too far, but at least you won’t have to use valuable brainpower thinking up excuses to avoid the laundry. We can’t guarantee that your new space will make you feel like Cinderella after the ball, but you should at least have a great place to store those seldom-used glass slippers.