Ella's Laundry

I received a round of applause the other day.  It was just out of the blue.  Ella, who runs the laundry at Landis Homes and has been there for 23 years, wanted to show me her new facilities since they have moved into them.  It’s nothing fancy at all:  they have painted block walls, exposed plank ceilings, and painted concrete floors.  The floor to ceiling height is about 8’-0”, so all of the piping and ductwork is exposed as well. 

What she and her staff were so excited about were the nine windows they got.  Their previous location was in a basement with no windows.  They so desperately wanted daylight, that they had me put in two small windows into an areaway that gets just minimal indirect light.  But since she and her staff once went five years without any of them taking a single sick day, they were to get what they wanted.  And most of the ladies who work in the laundry ride their bikes to work, even in the snow!

So Ella introduced me to the staff as the person responsible for giving them their windows.  Ella explained to me that the first shift starts at 3 AM, and the highlight of their day is to watch the sunrise though their windows that look across the pond and the farmland in the background.

As we preach to our other clients the importance of daylight and connections to nature, we can all take a lesson from Ella at the Landis Homes laundry.  She gets it.

(Photo Credit - Gregg Scott)