The One with the BBQ (Cabinets & Drawers)

I had the honor of being part of a very special gift from a friend to a friend. My client went above and beyond for a friend by helping her recover after a recent surgery. As a thank you for her help, she gifted my services to my client. I just love how this story illustrates friendship and paying it forward. It is such a JOY to do this work. I hope this encourages you as we go into the weekend.

My client has excellent design style and the clutter in the kitchen was really hiding some of the beautiful work she has done to turn an otherwise cookie-cutter kitchen into a stylish space. That said, we had a great backdrop to execute the ITS ON organizing process - white cabinets, open shelving, and black countertops with pops of color made it easy to take her space to the #nextlevel.

To make the most of her cabinet space, we created zones for cooking, baking, small appliances, serving dishes and cookware. Above you see how we corralled jsut backing items into one cupboard using turn tables and acrylic bins to corral all the baking goodies.

Next we focused in on the drawer space. We paired down to the essentials, eliminating duplicates and used acrylic dividers to delineate sections within each drawer.

“PRO TIP: Place a label underneath each utensil area so everyone knows where it goes even if the item is removed. ”

When we started this project, my client had four “junk drawers.” In a smaller kitchen this was taking up valuable real estate. We paired down items to two drawers, used acrylic dividers again to delineate where things should go and our ninja labeling trick to make sure they stay organized. The second half of this project was coming up with a solution for all of the papers that seem to find a landing place in this galley style kitchen so we created a drop zone, home work station, mail station and implemented some counter-top solutions. Stay tuned.

See it. Use it. Enjoy it.