I thought I would share this little kitchen idea with some of my new visitors from Meredith’s blog Like Merchant Ships. As always I love reading your comments and hearing what you have to share. For my regular readers here, make sure you visit Meredith’s blog to see what I suggested for her pantry makeover.
The shelving in this pantry is just 4 inches deep and allows for all of your pantry needs to be front and center without hiding behind another item. What a great sized pantry right? Unfortunately most of us don’t have this luxury, but if you did would you even consider a layout like this?
For a kitchen that possibly has no pantry at all we see these shelves again but on the back wall of the kitchen. While it is a great use of space I can only image what my kids could do with shelves like this.
So what do you think about this “open pantry” concept. Shelving shallow enough to fit everything without crowding, good idea or more trouble than it’s worth?
[Images from: Top- Gridley & Graves for House Beautiful, Bottom- Jean-Marc Palisse for Cote Sud found via Ill Seen, Ill Said]
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I think a pantry like this is wonderful for the homecook, who uses lots of primary ingredients. Not so great, perhaps, for lots of packaged snacks. (I personally wouldn’t want to see a shelf full of poptarts up there. Not so pretty.)But I think with a minimalist vision in mind, this system would be great…you can see what you have on hand, and keep what you have to a minimum. I love the pics Tanna! Abbie
I’ve seen something like this before but it had several sliding doors to cover the shelves and was housed against one wall of a very large kitchen. I certainly wouldn’t consider it without, I hate dusting!
When we redesigned our kitchen a couple of years ago I decided upon all drawers and I love it. They are all categorised by type (flours, pasta, rice & grains, cans, jars & bottle etc.) this means I have instant access but it is all hidden :o)
I have wanted a pantry like that for a loooooooonnngggg time. I think they’re awesome.
I like the functionality of it. It would be great to be able to see everything at a glance. It would be great for the person who didn’t put the groceries away to be able to tell, right away, where stuff was put.
But I don’t think I’d like to live with it, in reality. Too much visual clutter. I have a three-year-old. I have enough visual clutter in my house as it is.
Also, it’s only going to look “cute” if you buy cute-looking groceries and arrange them in fashionable artsy ways. If you are a magazine stylist, for instance, you probably know how to do that. But my regular groceries are not cute, and I don’t think they’d make a super display.
Well said Heather, “my regular groceries are not cute” Neither are mine! It would be fun to have glass jars and cool containers but it would be so much more to upkeep.
I actually love it! I prefer more alternative ways of organization an home decor and think this is fabulous. I think any “solution” has a couple of flaws that may have to be considered but I would definitely prefer having everything easy to find to digging through the pantry. Also, kitchens don’t tend to get as dusty as rooms that are carpeted, I don’t think it’d be horrendous. :) Great options, thanks!
Actually, taking care of dust and/or visual overload could both be address by adding a curtain that fits your decor…depending on your set up.
While this concept looks great in these photos, it wouldn’t work for me (I hadn’t even thought of the dust aspect) because I have a family of 9, and the size of the boxes, bags, jars, and cans I put in my pantry wouldn’t work well there.
I think the wall art it would create would be too overwhelming for me… too visually stimulating. ALTHOUGH… it would make it easier to tell the child and hubby where to find things. No digging. I like my little closet pantry! ~J
No thanks I want all mine behind closed doors
I love the look but I do see is mega dusting & cleaning plus maintaining it to always look neat when it’s exposed like this. I like pantries that close personally.
What I really like is the shallowness – this means you can actually see what you have. On the down side – things like cereal boxes or bowls don’t fit so you’d have to have some deeper ones (like on the top photo).
I do love these though – we did something similar to this in our tiny bathroom – went into the wall several inches and built floor to ceiling shelves for storage. We used bins to store everything so it stays fairly neat.
I also see what you mean about the kids but it’s the ladders that would scare me with mine!!
Nice.
Nice photos and very creative – using the vertical space and space that might not always be used.