This morning Taylor and I met with a new client for an in-home organizing consultation, an experience that must feel odd for the client. I say odd because in most cases they haven’t met any of the professional organizers from Kuzak’s Closet before so we are complete strangers that they are taking on a tour of all of the nooks and crannies that most house guests never get to see. I mean, how many of your friends come over and you take them into your closet to show them the pile of shoes in the corner that you are thinking about purging, or that pile of paperwork that’s been on your kitchen island for a month? On a Kuzak’s Closet consultation tour they are opening closets, pointing at stacks of paperwork, and in some cases taking us down the hall to that bedroom (you probably have one too) that has the door closed 80% of the time and is filled with unmade decisions which most people call clutter.
Typically the last stop of the tour is the area that the clients are struggling with most, it just seems to be a natural pattern like they want to warm up to us before they commit to the main issue at hand. For today’s consultation that space was the kitchen and our client was fed up! While she pointed out things she hated I was taking in the layout, the fun turquoise island, and the stainless steel appliances when I realized why she was frustrated. That’s when I asked, “where is your pantry?” and she said, “we don’t really have one.” Ah, ha! This was the pivotal problem that we needed to solve because in my book, having a dedicated pantry is the key to curbing kitchen clutter and congestion.
No matter how large a kitchen is the importance of having an organized dedicated pantry space is critical. Personally my whole week can be thrown off is my pantry isn’t in sync. I have a system for food storage and a system for maintenance as well. Monday’s are garbage day at our house so I always make a point to clean out the fridge and pantry on Sundays so I can get the junk out of the house and fill up the recycling and compost bins. As I go through my pantry and fridge I take stock of what we are out of and begin to create a shopping list. Chris had been doing our meal planning lately so I typically pass the list off to him and once it is complete one of us will hit the grocery store on Sunday or Monday night to stock up.
To have the perfectly organized pantry it’s all about carving out zones. The photos from today’s post are from a pantry that we recently set up in Menlo Park in a newly built home. The cabinet maker that our client worked with designed shallow shelving so nothing will get lost in the back and a nice width for us to keep like items together on each shelf. This is the second project we’ve tackled with him so it’s fun to work with such a nice quality product. The house has a rustic farmhouse look with some modern touches like black hardware so we chose products to contain snacks like nuts and chips that would fit in with the design.
This client and her family eat primarily gluten free so grains play a big part in their meals. At their old house they had open bags of rice and beans on the shelves so I couldn’t wait to replace that system with labeled jars to keep everything visible and fresh.
By swapping out the bags for jars we saved the client so much space and the pantry now has a much cleaner look and feel. Her husband and kids can easily take a peek and see what they are running low on and on shopping days they and refresh the jars the newly stocked goodies. We used chalk labels so when the items change so can the labels and when you eat fresh and seasonally that is important.
Taylor sourced the products for this project and she found these new tosca baskets from The Container Store that I just love. We used them in a separate section of the pantry that is dedicated to snacks and they are so darn cute!
The family mostly eats gluten free due to the husband’s allergies so if there are items with gluten in the pantry they stay on the lower shelves for the kids to grab and go. I love having this snack pantry next to the main pantry. We don’t have any allergy issues but I’ve created a little snack shelf in our pantry since this project and I’ve noticed that it helps remind me to pack enough snacks for the day since on most days I don’t really eat a real lunch.
In this full size shot of the pantry you’ll see zones for entertaining and snacks, canned goods and pasta, grains, and then baking. It’s organized so that the items used most often are at eye level and likes are with likes with everything facing forward, just like at the grocery store!
If your kitchen flow feels off check out the status of your pantry, it might just need a tune up! Now that the holidays are over and a resolutions are still in the air now is the perfect time for a clean slate! Happy organizing!
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