Thank you rjr220! Very helpful thread with some really amazing drawer ideas! I will get out my measuring tape, and also check out gizmonkie's photos.

Thanks again!

While you have your measuring tape out, you might want to go to a place that has a display of your cabinets so you can measure how much usable inside space a drawer has for a certain size drawer front. When your KD says a drawer is 10" deep and 36" wide, that probably means that it is in a cabinet that is 36" wide and has a drawer front that is 10" high. What that means for the usable inside dimension of the drawer depends on the cabinet type and brand.

For example, with our frameless cabinets, the usable height of the drawer is about 1.7" less than the drawer height. That 1.7" includes the thickness of the drawer bottom, the space below the drawer bottom for the undermount rails and the drawer front hanging down a little below that to cover the rails. For the top drawer, the height loss is about 2.1" - the extra .6" is because the top of the drawer overlaps the rail at the cabinet top a bit.

The width of the inside of a drawer in our cabinets is about 2" less than the cabinet width. That's due to the width of the cabinet sides plus the width of the drawer sides plus a bit of a gap between the cabinet side and the drawer.

For framed cabinets, the space loss will be somewhat greater. How much depends on how much the drawer overlaps the frame and how much frame shows at the sides.

It's best to not exceed 30" in cabinet width if that drawer is planned to hold a substantial weight. Exceeding that width and deflection(or bowing) is a concern over time, in which you'll need to increase the thickness of the material(drawer bottom or same case in a shelf for that matter) to compensate, especially at the 36".

Frank, I disagree. Our old kitchen which didn't even have fancy modern drawer glides, had 36" wide pot and pan drawers about 10 or 11 inches deep so they carried a lot of weight. They were in use for more than 35 years when remodeled and had no deflection or bowing problems. 36" is a very practical drawer width especially for items like pots and pans which have handles that need to be fitted in. I have no hesitation in getting 36" wide drawers.

BTW, the wall cabinet in our closet bar is 5 feet wide and the shelves in that aren't bowing either.

Thank you for the responses! I did got to a cabinet display just this morning, but didn't read your posts until afterwards...I wish I had brought my measuring tape!

I had similar concerns about weight overloads when I realized how wide a 36" drawer is. I am glad you didn't have any issues, Cloud swift. Anyone else have a loaded 36 inch drawer without any issues over time?

I'd like to add a warning about huge drawers as well. Make sure you have very strong construction and excellent hardware. I'm a fan of more drawers rather than larger drawers. Our large drawers are for storing pots. They are bulky, but not very heave. Still, 30" is as large as we are going.

As for size, what do you intend to put into them. Take it out, stack it and measure. My favorite stock pot is 8 3/4" high withe the lid on upside down. So my deepest drawer needs a 9" deep inside measurement. It's worth the effort to do this exercise with all of your cabinets and drawers. Most people select sizes without the slightest concern as to whether their stuff will fit, or whether they are paying for wasted space.

Design all your storage them around the anticipated contents. Don't guess. Measure twice, have the cabinet maker cut once. There's nothing worse than a shelf that is just 1" too narrow to hold all of your glasses or 1/4" shorter than your favorite champagne flutes. Arrrrgh!

I won't say how I learned this lesson. ~:o)

Ok, you have all scared me away from the 36" drawer. We will be getting Brookhaven frameless, which say they hold up to 100 pounds, but it definitely seems best to err of the side of caution. (Especially after reading another thread about drawer strength!)

Thanks for your input, everyone!

Hollister, does Brookhaven use Blum Tandembox drawers? The Blum drawers come with great interior fittings to help you organize drawer contents, which might affect the size drawers you choose. Here is an example:

This is Ikea, but they use all Blum fittings.

We have 36'' drawers that hold pots, including cast iron. They're 10 years old--no problems at all. Not sure what the hardware is as we didn't put them in, but very likely Blum as they are full-extension and I think that was pretty cutting-edge a decade ago.

They are under a 36'' cooktop--30'' would be a design issue in our case.

They're full overlay and 8 3/4'' deep (interior depth).

HTH!

i don't think i'd want 36" just because i think they'd be hard to open with stuff in them. that's a wide area to pull out. for me anyway - i'm short so i guess my arms are also...

I have two 36-inch drawers under my cooktop (shallow false drawer on top), both full of heavy pots and pans. Not at all hard to open.

morton5, I love your drawer fittings! So organized!

Thanks for more input, everyone. I love your organization system, Morton5! I have no idea if Brookhaven has Blum Tandembox; I know they have soft-close and full- extension....The catalog doesn't give much detail beyond that. I saw those inserts at IKEA and was thinking that maybe it would be cheaper to get those and put them into the Brookhaven drawers, if they fit. I love the way they are so adjustable, so you can easily change what goes in each drawer.

Thanks again!

Morton5 - what width is that drawer? Looks like a dream come true!

Thanks, it's a 30" drawer, with interior measurement of 27" wide x 20.5" front-to-back x 10.25" deep

I love the Blum Tandembox drawers. Once I saw the organizing features I was sold. The interior rails can be snapped in in any configuration you need to create compartments. The coated metal sides and melamine bottom of the drawer are so easy to clean. I have had no trouble with the 30" drawers supporting the weight of dishes, pots and pans, and canned goods. I think they are rated for 55 kilos-- that's 121 lbs.

My cabs are Ikea, which uses Blum fittings, but I think some higher-end European cab makers, like Poggenpohl and Bulthaup, use the Blum Tandembox as well. And, custom frameless cab makers can also build with them.

I live 10 miles from an Ikea, and they had a door style I liked, so using Ikea was an easy choice for me. Some people put custom doors on Ikea boxes to get the functionality of the Blum fittings, and to save $.

I should have included in my original post that the 30" width optimum is a rule of thumb, but as exampled by others, can be increased as long as consideration towards upgrading the construction details of the drawer(or shelf). Along with considering thickness of material, type of material used, assembly techniques and/or a upgrade in hardware.

I'm always impressed at what's being offered on some of the relatively affordable lines of cabinets nowadays, what used to be only offered with high-end cabinetry or at a high dollar premium option from just a few years ago.

Our 36" pot and pan drawers open easily even with some heavy cast iron and some glass baking dishes. They have two handles but I often open them by pulling on one handle. They have Blum glides.

I guess 'heavy' or 'hard' is relative. yrs ago I wouldn't have had a problem with it. now i can't use cast iron or even my 4 qt corning ware dutch oven anymore - it's too heavy for me if it has anything in it...it's heavy enough empty! lol!
ah well, 36" would be way too big for my 2 3.5qt pots, 2 skillets and 1 lid...i hope to add a 1 or 1.5 qt pot to my 'collection' in the future. i don't think it'd take up the difference.

so, how deep do you need a silverware drawer to be? I'm hoping my utensils don't go vertical when I'm sleeping and dance around in there... hopefully they don't need a lot of depth in the drawer...

desertsteph, I just measured all my current utensil/saran wrap/etc. drawers. I have one that is 2.5" deep inside, which is really annoying. The saran wrap constantly gets stuck when I try to close it. The one I use for spatulas is 4" inside (usable space) and that seems a lot better. I am going to make sure I have around 4" of usable space in my new utensil drawers.

Our silverware (really flatwear as it is stainless steel, not silver) drawers are 3.2" usable height and that works fine for the flatwear, knives and some utensils. We have 3.6" usable height in our utensil drawers and that fits the rest of the stuff like potato mashers and dry measure cups. The drawer front height for both is 5.25". That's also the height for our wraps (plastic wrap, foil, etc) drawer. We wanted to maximize our drawer space because we keep kosher and so we have different sets of stuff for milk and for meat plus some for parve (neither milk nor meat) food.

By the way, also remember that you lose about 2" of width in frameless cabinets and more in framed cabinets which depends on the width of the frame. It means that the useable inside of a drawer in a 15" wide cabinet will be 13" or less. I find that kind of narrow and preferred to keep our narrowest drawers 21" or wider. We used our narrower spaces for tray cabinets for cutting boards, baking sheets, wire racks, etc and one next to the cooktop for pullout shelves with oils, vinegars and other bottled stuff.