Kitchen Storage: Drawers, Larder Units and the End of the Dead Corner

Why kitchen storage is a question of reach

In the kitchen it is not how much fits in that counts, but how quickly you can get to something. A deep base unit with a hinged door and one shelf has a lot of volume, but whatever stands at the back is practically lost. You kneel, unload, find, load again. After a few months, whatever is at the back simply stays there.

That is why we begin every storage plan with the question: what do you pick up, and how often? A ranking results. The daily goes in the zone between hip and shoulder, the weekly below or above it, the rare into the edge zones: right at the top, right at the bottom, in the plinth.

Good storage is the kind you do not search. You reach out, and it is there.

What the search costs you. Every day you search, kneel and unload is a few minutes you do not get back, multiplied by years. A cluttered worktop also makes the whole kitchen look smaller and more tired than it is. The fix rarely needs more cabinets. It needs a smarter inside, and it starts with the humble drawer.

Drawers instead of doors: the most important decision

In base units, drawers and pull-outs are almost always a better choice than doors with shelves. You see the whole depth from above, nothing disappears at the back, and you have to bend less. Modern full-extension runners glide easily and softly, even when loaded with pots or crockery. The permissible load depends on the fitting in question, and we choose it according to what goes in the drawer.

A tried and tested layout for base units:

The exact dimensions depend on the fitting system and the carcass height. What matters is the principle: every drawer has a job, and its height suits its contents. Whether the drawers open with a handle or handleless changes the interior hardly at all, but it does change daily life; more on this in the article The handleless kitchen. A drawer that is too tall for flat items wastes space, one that is too shallow for pots forces you to stack.

Doors keep their place where appliances are built in, in the sink base unit with waste separation, or with very narrow units. Behind tall-unit fronts, too, doors with inner drawers behind them can make sense, because they create a continuous surface. With the drawers settled, the question is what goes where.

Zones instead of cabinets: order by work step

A kitchen works well when things are stored where they are needed. That sounds obvious but is often forgotten. Plates stand far from the dishwasher, pots not by the hob, the chopping board not by the worktop.

That is why we plan the kitchen in five zones that follow the sequence of cooking:

1. Provisions: food, tins, dry goods, fridge. Ideally at the edge of the kitchen, near the entrance, so that shopping has short distances to travel.
2. Crockery and glasses: near the dishwasher, so that unloading needs no detours, and not far from the dining table.
3. Washing up and waste: sink, dishwasher and waste separation form a unit.
4. Preparation: the largest free worktop, with knives, boards, bowls and spices beneath it.
5. Cooking: hob and oven, with pots, pans, oils and cooking utensils beneath.

This order is not a rigid rule but a good guide. With an island it is spread over two sides; in a single-run kitchen it runs from left to right or the reverse. Which kitchen layout suits your workflow is described in the article L-shaped, U-shaped, island or single-run. Zones are only half the answer. Some things need to stand tall.

The pull-out larder unit and other tall-unit solutions

A pull-out larder unit (the German "Apothekerschrank", or apothecary cabinet) is a tall unit with a continuous pull-out to which several shelves are fixed one above the other. When you draw it out, you see all the provisions at a glance from both sides. It is often only 30 to 40 centimetres wide and therefore also fits into niches beside the fridge.

The pull-out larder unit is ideal for tins, jars, spices, oils and packets that would otherwise vanish in deep cabinets. With very wide versions and heavy loads, however, the pull-out becomes stiffer, so we choose width and fitting according to the planned load.

Alternatives in the tall unit:

• Inner drawers behind doors: several drawers behind two tall doors, good for provisions and crockery.
• Tall unit with retractable doors: the doors slide away sideways into the carcass, with a work niche behind for coffee machine, toaster and blender.
• Broom cupboard with hanging system: vacuum cleaner, brooms and cleaning products have a fixed place, often with a socket for the charger.

Which appliances belong in the tall unit wall and at what height is described in the article Choosing appliances by daily routine. Anyone with space for a separate pantry can move a lot out of the kitchen. How a Speis (the Austrian larder) is planned today is covered in the article Larder and pantry.

Picture the first morning with a pull-out larder: you slide it open with one finger, see the whole stock at a glance, and the coffee is exactly where you reach. And then there is the corner, the one place no drawer reaches.

The end of the corner

The corner is the most difficult place in any L-shaped or U-shaped kitchen. A classic corner unit with a door and shelf is deep and dark, and whatever stands at the back is practically unreachable. There are several solutions for the corner, and each has its price.

With a peninsula that projects into the room, the corner can often be used from the living side as an open shelf or cabinet for glasses or books. That is usually the most elegant solution. Sometimes it is also better to accept the corner honestly as dead space and put the effort saved into better drawers elsewhere.

Not every corner has to be used. But no corner should be a place where things disappear.

The big decisions are made. But kitchens are won or lost in the small things.

Small details with a big effect

Alongside the big decisions, it is often the details that make a kitchen pleasant in daily life. They cost little if planned early, and a great deal of annoyance if they are missing.

• Dividers in drawers: made of wood rather than plastic, made to fit exactly, so that nothing slides about.
• Knife block in the drawer: knives lie securely and the worktop stays clear.
• Waste separation with enough fractions: in Vienna several fractions are collected separately, which needs more than two bins.
• Sockets in cabinets: for chargers, food processor or coffee machine behind the front.
• Interior lighting: in deep tall units and pull-out larders, so that you can see at the back too.
• Plinth drawer: the hidden space that almost every kitchen has and hardly anyone uses.

In a small kitchen, it is precisely these details that decide whether the worktop stays clear. The electrical details in particular must be settled before the furniture is built. Why that is so is described in the article on electrical planning. And who builds the inside matters as much as how it is planned.

Made to measure or system: what changes the interior

Many interior solutions come as systems from the large fitting manufacturers, installed in branded kitchens and joinery kitchens alike. The difference often lies in the details: does a drawer fit exactly into the niche beside the old chimney breast? Can a pull-out be made 23 centimetres wide if that is exactly what is left? Are the drawer dividers made of solid wood?

In Viennese Altbau flats with crooked walls, niches and high ceilings, made-to-measure work plays to its strengths. With us, the joinery Tischlerkultur makes such elements in its own workshop, in the Viennese tradition since 1935, and you deal with one person throughout. When a joinery kitchen suits and when a branded kitchen does is compared in the article A kitchen from the joiner or a branded kitchen.

Appliances and technology also claim storage space. A hob with an integrated extractor shortens the drawers beneath it, and a raised dishwasher changes the tall unit wall. What this means in concrete terms is set out in the article Hob with integrated extractor. How we plan kitchens, from the interior fittings to installation, can be seen on the page about our fitted kitchens.