Thursday, December 17, 2009

Odd-sized Kitchen Drawer? Organize Your Utensils

When I moved into my new home this spring, I had the usual batch of organizing questions. Where should everything go? As many people do, I began with the heart of the home: the kitchen.

I hit a snag right away, though. There were two options to house my day-to-day utensils. On one side of the kitchen, there was a drawer that was too small to hold an average-size utensil tray. On the other side, in a less convenient location, was a large drawer where the utensils would only fill half of the space and have to share with other items.

Luckily, I found a great product from The Container Store called "Custom Drawer Organizers." I was able to give away my old utensil tray, and custom-create three spaces just for forks, knives, and spoons. I also used it in the drawer below to separate whisks, spatulas, etc. It was a great solution.

If you plan to use this product to customize your kitchen drawers, here are some suggestions:

1. Measure twice, cut once.

2. Err on the side of "tightness," as the plastic connections give a little over time.

3. If you are uncomfortable scoring plastic (with an exacto knife) or breaking it apart by hand, ask a friend to help you. The process doesn't take a lot of strength, but it does take accuracy.

Overall, I'm happy with the versatility this product has given my kitchen drawers. While a little pricey, the solution was much cheaper than redesigning my kitchen drawers and much less irritating that having items in an inconvenient place.

2 comments:

Carol said...

Oh that system looks nice in your drawer. It looks more sturdy than most of the other pictures I've seen.

For the record, if you or your clients have your heart set on a wood organizer, orderlydrawer.com makes custom ones. They are priced by size, and especially for small drawers, the price is really reasonable.

Sara said...

Thanks, Carol!