If you’ve lived with your kitchen for awhile, chances are you’ve got drawers full of stuff you rarely use and cupboards you just hate. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a well-organized kitchen that makes food preparation a pleasure?
Here are some of the latest ideas and products for whipping a kitchen into shape — and most of them can be done without hiring a contractor to do a major remodel.
Divide and conquer
Kitchens function best when divided into work zones, says Josee Berlin, an interior designer for Ikea USA. She cites three: storage (fridge/freezer/pantry); washing (sink/dishwasher); and cooking (oven/cooktop/microwave).
“Work zones give your kitchen a practical structure. Placing them well is crucial to achieving an ergonomic work triangle, with a natural workflow and everything within reach,” Berlin says.
If you’re planning a new kitchen, place your oven and stove near sinks and worktops so you aren’t walking too far with hot pots and pans, she says. A worktop near pantry cabinets and fridge makes unpacking groceries easy.
And if you’re not planning a new kitchen? Spring, before the farmer’s market and grilling seasons heat up, is a great time to do a cabinet-and-drawer reboot.
Take your drawer and cabinet measurements to your favorite organization source and buy a guess at what you think you might need (save receipts, because once you reorganize, you’ll likely have adjustments to make).
Resort and reorganize according to these work zones. Shouldn’t the silverware and dishes go near the cooking zone? Could you move the pantry supplies nearer to the refrigerator? And what IS that gadget? Why do you have five corkscrews and a butter curler?
If you find that space is tight, consider a stainless-steel cart with lockable wheels for portable storage and extra prep space. But if you’ve done your reboot, you won’t be stocking new storage with stuff you don’t need.
Advanced rebooting
If you’re finding that your storage doesn’t work for the way you cook, you can do a more advanced re-outfitting of cabinets and drawers so they work for you. Adjustable drawer dividers and shelf inserts at different depths make accessing your most frequently used tools easier.
The drawers in Ikea’s new Sektion kitchen system open fully, eliminating that awkward nowheresville at the back of many drawers (remember, that’s where you found three of your five corkscrews). The system’s new horizontal hinge design allows for additional slim storage in what was dead space above the drawer — good for tools, towels and spices (the last of which should be kept in a cool dark space and not on or above the stove).
A quiet-close mechanism and optional LED lights make the system handy for middle-of-the-night cookie raids; see it at .
Tool and gadget update
Again, here’s where clarity saves you space — when you ditch what you don’t need, you can see the gaps where you do actually need to buy something or replace a worn-out or damaged cooking tool.
You don’t need a lot of stuff, says Craig Norton, director of operations at the Prince George Hotel in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
“Buying a pot and pan for every dish is a mistake. One good large Dutch oven, one sauté pan, one 4-quart saucepan, one omelet/crepe pan, one cast-iron pan and that’s it,” he advises. He stores lids on the door to free up shelf space.
“Gadgets are the biggest waste of space — egg slicers, green bean cutters, all that stuff. Just use a knife,” laughs Norton.
However, if you’re a proud collector of small tools, consider a rolling mechanic’s tool cart with shallow drawers that can be tucked in a closet when not in use.
To hold knives, BASE4’s KnifeDock is a slim-profile slab of magnetized walnut, bamboo or acacia wood. It’s at .
If you’re a baker, consider consolidating the ingredients you use.
“I put all baking ingredients in one bin — flour, sugar, baking soda, etc. — and just haul it out when making something,” Norton says. Want to reward yourself for your reboot? Invest in a slab of cool marble to make pastry rolling easy.
More space-savers
House Beautiful’s editor in chief, Sophie Donelson, likes OXO’s stackable Greensaver containers, which have carbon filters in the lid to reduce spoilage. But her favorite small-space storage solutions are collapsible tools from Joseph Joseph.
“Just about everything they make either folds, collapses or nests to save room in the drawer. I wanted to toss all my existing tools and start fresh when I saw these,” she says.
Measuring cups, a whisk and nesting utensils are part of the colorful collection at joseph .
Some experts suggest checking out restaurant supply houses for high-quality, affordable items. Commercial-kitchen-grade, stainless-steel pans come in a variety of squares and rectangles that you can stack to save space.
Hanging rails with “S”-shaped hooks provide extra storage without taking up real estate. Sturdy racks can hold pots and pans, plates, utensils, sieves and even a small herb garden.
Ikea’s Rimforsa wall system combines steel rails and hooks with bamboo containers. And Elfa’s bonded-steel no-tools wall and rack system can turn a door into a handy pantry ().
Liberate even more space by using zipper plastic bags or stackable mason jars for things like tea bags, pet treats and dried foods, eliminating bulky packaging.
Right at hand
Yes, visual clutter won’t bring a design magazine’s photo team to your door. But if your kitchen’s a workhorse, don’t worry about keeping it “showroom-ready.” Your food processor, scale, utensils and blender should be right out where you need them.
Norton likes to keep a lazy Susan next to the stove with olive oil, a dish of salt and a pepper grinder.
But for those items you use only a couple of times a year?
Norton advises getting them out of the kitchen altogether. “Put the turkey roaster in the basement with the tree ornaments,” he says.
The Denver Post staff contributed to this story.
