The problem of trying to use that interior corner space is a long standing one. I had lots of customers specify the lazy susan option when the fad became widespread, and I had a significant number decide that they hated it after some use, because stuff would fall off when it was spun while searching for the item that they wanted. Then you had the problem of trying to reach into the very back of the cabinet corner AROUND the lazy susan. If you think its hard to reach the back of a corner cabinet, try it without completely unloading the items from the lazy susan and reaching around the apparatus on your knees with your head buried in the cabinet.
I deferred to clients who wanted them, but if they asked, I came around to recommending interior corner shelves as the best solution to a thorny problem.
Agreed. This is an open challenge for my cat Pastel, who loves to figure out how to get into drawers and cabinets. At least with the corner Lazy Susan, we had a door we could secure with a safety latch.
Currently, I have a glass rack right underneath my cabinets over the sink, where my other cat Ruby loves to lounge.
Well yes, the Mysterious Cabinet of Mystery is open! Our Agatha is also summoned when I open the door under the cabinet, but then she enters, finds there’s still nothing interesting in there and leaves almost immediately.
Rather than a Lazy Susan, my back shelf corners in the kitchen cabinets are where the seasonal or ‘once in a blue moon’ items live. I have a huge stainless steel bowl I could make salad for 50 in; I don’t use it often, but don’t want to get rid of it either, so it lives in the ‘back-back’ of the bottom cabinet. Ditto canning supplies, the turkey roaster, and my grandmother’s Imperial Candlewick glassware dishes.
We finally gave up on consumer-grade trash cans, and bought a commercial one, the heavy galvinized-steel step-can kind used for handling biohazard waste in hospitals. Everything on it just works. I did like having under-sink trash in my flat in Norway, but there I sorted everything for composting or recycling and took it out of the flat every couple of days, so being small wasn’t a problem and proximity to the sink and adjacent counter was a plus.
My dad’s carpenter (don’t get me started) offered to renovate his kitchen for me when the house became mine. I told him how much I hate corner cabinets. So he installed something like this:
I hate it, but at least the version I have (only two levels, and a smaller cabinet opening) was installed with much sturdier hardware than seems to be the case in the OP. I mean, why re-invent the wheel if you’re not going to make it at least as well done as what is already available?
We’ve got two corner lazy susans that have the rounded shell so that stuff has to try SUPER hard to get stuck in them. So far, so good! There’s a third corner that is behind the bar/counter side; I’m about to cut through the bar side and add a door there because it’s a total hobbit hole with a bonus side opening that dumps stuff onto the floor next to the oven. WTF, even?!
Neat design but I imagine the supports have to be pretty skookum, for sure into the studs. Fill those things with pans or bulk goods and there’s four sizeable cantilevers just waiting to pull screws out.
Some of us have cats. I prefer to not rinse a pan before use because a fuzzbucket was sleeping in it or find flour everywhere when a shelf is too crowded for proper prowling
On a serious note- it’s more about the space looking neat and tidy. A restaurant kitchen usually looks fairly organized, otherwise objects cannot be found. But it doesn’t look neat and tidy. Open shelving is extremely useful, I agree, but it would drive me a little batty ifnthat was the case all over my home. Add in that most people do the bare minmum of cooking and the ubiquitous closed-door shelving is triumphant
We’re planning an all-new kitchen the the Craftsman bungalow we have gutted (while living elsewhere), so I have many opinions. I’ve been collecting “inspo” for decades.
(1) Interior corners in base cabinetry. My current, pre-existing kitchen has a very acceptable lazy susan. I recommend: do have a ledge on the round shelves, don’t try to store extra things behind the round shelves, don’t store top-heavy things, and don’t give it a hard yank to spin it. For alternatives, I’m drawn to [image] – if you have enough cabinet-face footage around the sides. I also think half-moons may be better: [image] (with some hope of using at least one empty corner behind).
(2) Location of trash can: We plan to put it in a base cabinet next to the food prep area, but have the door (and the can) be about 10 inches shorter than the opening, leaving open space at the top to toss things through. (See #4 below about why we don’t have to worry about it getting stinky.)
(3) Open shelves. I guess if you have a really good stove fan and use it every single time you cook, you may be able to avoid a film of oil on the shelves and objects (and then dust stuck in the oil). Yuck.
(4) When we talk trash (hee) we also have to talk composting. Here in Portland OR we have curbside pickup of separated compostable materials, and it’s illegal to mix them in with regular trash. I dreamed up a solution to replace the “can sitting on counter” with “can mounted under hole in countertop (with a lid),” and then Google told me it exists as a (very pricey) commercial product!!
And may I say how much I love the internet? Our previous kitchen remodel was in 1987, and we had stacks of books and magazines. But now I can find millions of ideas, plus dream up a product and then discover it exists!
I was heavily influenced to plan for point-of-use storage by a 1983 book “The Motion-Minded Kitchen” by Sam Clark.
We also got a bit of consulting help (and a cardboard model!) from an architect who was just starting out in our town: Sarah Susanka, who went on to write the best-selling book, “The Not So Big House” and about seven follow-on books. One of my best name-drops for the right audience!
This may sound crazy, but I think the only way to get full use of the dead space would be to have a shelving section that rises straight up out of the countertop, though it might need some motor assistance.
I’m lucky enough to have bought an old farmhouse in need of a total rehab and have a background in carpentry, so I finally got to design and build my own kitchen. It is a total game changer.
Kitchen island holds all cooking gear and the range and a “breakfast bar” to hang out and chat with whoever is doing the cooking that day, or help with prep. Pantry for spices and shelf foods. Commercial sink with the spray thing.
The real inspiration, though, was I installed the countertop along the wall free-standing, then put all my bottom cabinets on casters and put butcher block on top. So I can almost double my work surface, in any configuration. it’s great when doing breaded fish or any of those assembly line type things. My years working in restaurants paid off.
Oh, and zero corner cabinets. If you have a choice, just don’t.
You know what would work? Rolling shutters. That way you’d have open shelves while you cook and you can close them for dust protection and neatness while you don’t.
Edit: Apparently it does exist, even if it is extremely uncommon
That also means enough counter space and appliance storage to keep the area above it clear. Sometimes due to outlet placement, corners tend to be where gadgets sit.
Having dealt over the years with every single corner option available in multiple residences, I would agree that the drawers are the best solution for a bad situation. Make sure they’re the three different heights, as shown in the photo: shallower on top, deeper on the bottom. And also, look into the dividers one can buy to separate the front corners from the rest of the drawer, because otherwise everything shifts every time you open and close one of those doors. If you look carefully, you’ll see there’s a metal divider for the bottom (deepest) drawer…it looks adjustable!
![[image]](https://www.dakotakitchen.com/assets/images/accessories/Corner_Details.jpg){kind=link}
![[image]](https://www.rockler.com/media/catalog/product/cache/e48bc02676090cdee0f5e795d38346da/1/0/1001741-05-1000.jpg){kind=link}