How to Organize Deep Kitchen Drawers and Cabinets

For those of us with cozy kitchens (aka tiny kitchens) deep drawers are incredibly handy. But left unorganized they can quickly become hard to open and a tangled mess of kitchen essentials. You don’t need another junk drawer!

Deeper drawers provide spacious alternatives to shallow kitchen cabinets, make everyday things easier to reach, and make good homes for larger items. 

Spending an afternoon organizing kitchen cabinets and drawers feels good and downright cathartic. Taking stock of what you own and figuring out what you need and use to create a well-organized kitchen alleviates so much stress in the long run.

Let’s get to it. 

Decant Spices and Oils

I know decanting things from one container to another container feels “extra” and I suppose that’s the whole point.

If we’re going to spend time culling through our kitchens to make them organized and functional, we might as well make them aesthetically pleasing. 

Decanting spices into clearly labeled clear containers and using risers to organize and display them, keep deep kitchen cabinets from becoming dark voids of random stuff.

Kitchen cabinet space is precious real estate and needs to be treated as such!

My cabinets happen to be sort of high as well and these risers are the perfect size. They’re a great way to give me more access to my spices because the layout allows me to see what I have.

I can stack twelve spice jars per riser and it makes a huge difference in accessibility.

There’s even enough room for smaller items like my salts and oils. 

If your cabinets are high like mine, consider keeping lesser-used items on the top shelf and things you need access to daily on the lower shelves.

That’s a good rule of thumb for kitchen organization in general.

I find that as long as the things I need are easily accessible and within eyesight, I feel like the kitchen is working for me, not against me.

Use an In-Drawer Knife Block

Not only does an in-drawer knife block keep sharp objects contained and organized, they help to free up kitchen counter space. WINNING!!

Our knives didn’t come with a block of their own, so every time we opened a drawer it felt like we were at risk of losing a finger. We love living on the edge.

This hack not only tidies up the knife situation but frees up drawer space for other things.

I put our teas into the drawer using this organizer for easy access. But you could easily store things like aluminum foil, plastic wrap, oven mitts, dish towels, etc.

Make Friends with Bamboo Dividers

I need to take my advice on this one! To keep our countertops visually pleasing and somewhat uncluttered, I like to only keep our wooden cooking utensils on display.

That means all the other kitchen utensils get shoved into a drawer. I just bought these bamboo drawer dividers to help keep everything in its place.

I also grabbed these bamboo drawer organizers to help keep bulkier items from sliding all over. 

I love that my deep kitchen drawers allow for so much organizing potential, but without dividers or an organization system, it sort of defeats the purpose. 

However, I have learned a thing or two about how much weight a large drawer can hold. The best way to make sure the drawers don’t get damaged is to make sure the weight of everything is evenly distributed. 

For example, storing small appliances in deep lower cabinets would be a great way to get them off the counter when not in use.

I put our heaviest and least used items in the bottom drawer so that the top drawer(s) can accommodate our lighter and most used items. 

That way, everything is still within easy reach but doesn’t run the risk of being too heavy at any one level.

Kitchen Clean-Out Tips

• First step, take EVERYTHING out of the kitchen cabinets and drawers.
• When everything is in front of you, throw away anything expired or broken. 
• Donate duplicates of any utensils or kitchen appliances.
• Dedicate an afternoon to reclaiming your kitchen as your own space. Meal prep, morning coffee, and mealtimes will feel so much more peaceful.
• Before buying storage solutions, make sure to lay out where everything will live so that you know what specific items to buy.
• Measure your kitchen cabinets and drawers so you get the right size organizers.

Organizing those messy drawers and kitchen cabinets will be great for functionality, but even better for your mental health. 

Clear cabinets. Full and organized drawers. Can’t lose.

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