Storage & Organization
41 Kitchen Organizing Ideas That Will Save Your Sanity
A cluttered kitchen can be downright maddening, but these tips will help you get this most-used, hardest-to-keep-clean room in your home organized for good!
Functional Décor
Organize Your Fridge with a Six-Pack
Free Shelf Liner
Get a Cooking Caddy for Convenience
Swing-Out Pantry
Build any of these kitchen storage projects and much more with the help of the Family Handyman’s online school, DIY University. Take a class and learn how to create custom kitchen rollouts, a swing-out pantry and more. Check out all the classes here.
Tension Rod Storage Hack
To keep your cleaning supplies upright, hang them from a short tension rod inside your cabinet. Another clever idea is to slide a paper towel roll through the tension rod for easy access. This tension rod organization hack is also a great place to hang dish-drying towels and rubber cleaning gloves.
Spice Up Your Life
Surely you’ve heard of this revolutionary thing called a spice rack. Embrace it. When it comes to kitchen storage, all those little containers of cumin, oregano, and cinnamon can quickly overwhelm and confuse you. Stacking them in a cupboard without any logical order will only lead to chaos. The solution: spice rack. If you’re extremely organized, you can transfer your spices to uniform jars and add printed labels. Depends on how often you find yourself reaching for these flavorings.
Integrate Appliances into Your Kitchen Island
Use a Pool Noodle Inside a Drawer
Add a Display Shelf
A simple addition of molding along the upper cabinets adds a decorative touch as well as more storage space for displaying favorite dishes. It’s painted to match other features in the kitchen. Check out more amazing ideas for a small kitchen here.
Secure Your Kitchen Towels
We’ve collected hundreds of home tips throughout the years to make life a little easier for our readers. Here are 100 of the Handiest Home Tips.
Jars on Jars
Pullout Chopping Board
Photo: Courtesy of Dura Solutions
Install a Kitchen Cabinet Rollout
File Folders Kitchen Organization Hack
This kitchen organization hack is so easy and satisfying!
Kitchen Window Plant Perch
Do you like having fresh herbs at your fingertips? Keeping them on your counter takes up valuable space and doesn’t expose them to enough light. Try this easy storage idea: Install a wire shelf between the upper cabinets flanking your kitchen window. You can set your plants where they’ll get plenty of light without blocking the view. This also makes watering easy and keeps them readily available for snipping. Make sure to install the shelf high enough so you don’t bump into it when you’re working at the sink. Get more quick and clever kitchen storage ideas.
DIY Coffee Pod Organizer
Expand the Counter with a Kitchen Cart
A rolling kitchen cart is the next best thing to adding cabinets and countertop space. The top provides extra work space when you’re preparing that big Thanksgiving dinner. And the shelves below hold items that would otherwise consume countertop space. If you plan to use a cart for food preparation, choose one with a tough top like butcher block, stainless steel or plastic laminate. Some cart tops are glossy finished wood—beautiful, but not very durable. Carts come in a variety of wood finishes, so there’s a good chance you can match your existing cabinets. Or you can go for an eclectic look with a shiny metal or painted cart.
Instant Kitchen Cabinet Organizer
It’s Time to Toss Those Takeout Menus
Though your takeout bag comes with a menu or two, the reality is, you end up stuffing all that wasted paper in a drawer. Then before you know it, menu after menu, it’s hard for you to close your kitchen drawer. Toss those suckers in the recycling bin and stick to looking up menus online. Don’t miss these quick kitchen cleaning tips.
C-Clamp Paper Towel Rack
Create an instant paper towel dispenser with two C-clamps. Position and clamp them a roll’s width apart in a convenient spot, hold up the roll and push in the handles to hold it. Buy slick-looking C-clamps and install them in the kitchen, then fib to visitors about your chic designer hardware.
Wine Stash
What, no wine rack? No wine cellar either? No problem! You can just as easily store your wine collection in a deep kitchen drawer, if there’s one that’s vacant. Just be sure to alternate the direction of the bottle so that they nest well together. If you’re feeling ambitious, you could try making your own roll-out drawers to house your wine supply within a more spacious cupboard instead.
Easy-to-Build Knife Block
Display your kitchen cutlery in style with this handsome knife block. It’s fast, easy and fun to build, and includes a 6-in.-wide storage box for a knife sharpener.
To build one, you only need a 3/4-in. x 8-in. x 4-ft. hardwood board and a 6-in. x 6-1/2-in. piece of 1/4-in. hardwood plywood to match.
Begin by cutting off a 10-in. length of the board and setting it aside. Rip the remaining 38-in. board to 6 in. wide and cut five evenly spaced saw kerfs 5/8 in. deep along one face. Crosscut the slotted board into four 9-in. pieces and glue them into a block, being careful not to slop glue into the saw kerfs (you can clean them out with a knife before the glue dries). Saw a 15-degree angle on one end and screw the plywood piece under the angled end of the block.
Cut the 6-1/2-in. x 3-in. lid from the leftover board, and slice the remaining piece into 1/4-in.-thick pieces for the sides and end of the box. Glue them around the plywood floor. Cut a rabbet on three sides of the lid so it fits snugly on the box and drill a 5/8-in. hole for a finger pull. Then just add a finish and you’re set for years of happy carving!
In-Wall Pantry
In almost every room of your house, you can find tons of storage space hidden between the two sheets of drywall. Simple stud-space cabinets like the one we show here are great for capturing some of this wasted space. We’ll show you how to build them.
Space-Saving Nonstick Stackable Cookware Set
This stackable storage solution will free up some valuable space in your cabinets. The cookware set stacks and nests in any order, features a flat, tempered-glass cover to save even more space, and is made of durable anodized aluminum and is metal-utensil safe, so you can bet it can withstand your cooking trials and tribulations.
Photo: Courtesy of Calphalon
Decorative Backsplash Rack
Concealed Message Center
Better in a Basket
Racks for Canned Goods
Chalk It Up
Install Expandable Shelves in Cabinets
Stackable Nesting Kitchen Caboodle
It’s way too easy to toss mismatched bowls and other kitchen gear in a drawer and forget about them until the next time you need something. Avoid wasting time digging around for what you want while saving space with this stackable option. This is an affordable, space-saving, 10-piece mixing bowl, colander and measuring set that’s bound to make your life just a little easier.
Check out these other kitchen cabinet and drawer organizers you can build yourself.
Photo: Courtesy of Mexcallen
Plastic Bag Holder
Embrace the Openness
Cupboards are so passé; the latest trend in kitchen storage is to embrace the openness of basic shelving. This puts your pretty dishes on display and instantly invokes a sense of coziness to your kitchen. Note that you don’t need to fill every shelf with plates, bowls, and coffee mugs. Rather, you can integrate a little greenery here and there with potted plants and succulents.
From Office to Kitchen
You see an empty file holder, we see an opportunity for some clever kitchen storage. If you have an orphan file holder lying around, try converting it to the upright storage space where you arrange your aluminum foil, your parchment paper, your plastic bags, and more.
Refrigerator/Freezer Stackable Storage Bins
These clear plastic bins are great for keeping your pantry, refrigerator or freezer tidy while ensuring everything remains in sight. This will keep you from buying things when you don’t need them! The bins are BPA-free and feature built-in handles.
You can also organize your fridge with a six-pack!
Photo: Courtesy of Greenco
Mixed Materials
While the most common countertop consists of just one material, 2018 is seeing a spike in designs that feature more than one. So why not integrate your cutting board into your countertop? Looks amazing (and super-useful) to us! If you love stainless steel, be sure to check out the black stainless steel trend for home appliances.
Get Produce Off the Counter
Sometimes all that’s needed to spruce up a space is organization. This creative way to store fruits and vegetables is inexpensive and attractive. It’s also a bonus that this project will free up valuable counter space.
Don’t Let the Junk Drawer Overflow
It goes without saying that a junk drawer goes from being a place for miscellaneous items, to an overflowing space that has more non-essential items in it than ones you actually want to get easy access to. Go through your junk drawer quarterly, making sure anything that’s in there is something you truly need. The rest you can toss, like extra rubber bands, plastic bags, chopsticks, business cards, and more.
Pantry Cabinet in a Closet
Emergency Cash Stash
You never know when you’ll need a bit of emergency cash (or maybe just some fun spending money). Inside an empty tin can is the perfect saving spot. Stash it in the back of your pantry for a rainy day. We’ve got more where this came from! Check out these other secret hiding places in your home.
Disclosure: This post is brought to you by The Family Handyman editors, who aim to highlight products and services you might find interesting. If you buy them, we get a small share of the revenue from the sale from our commerce partners. We frequently receive products free of charge from manufacturers to test. This does not drive our decision as to whether or not a product is featured or recommended. We welcome your feedback. Have something you think we should know about? Contact us, here.