Before we remodeled, we had virtually NO drawers (one 12" stack does not count). These were taken shortly after we finished; later I swapped the frying pans and Tupperware, since the pans didn't need as much space. Our pots and pans were in a drawer under the range (but since that didn't change, I didn't take a photo).

The thing that made this work for us is that I had custom cabinets built, exactly to my specifications. The canister and sideways cake pan drawers were at the bottom of 3-drawer stacks; these drawers were about an inch deeper than the middle drawer in each stack. Had those drawers been of equal height, the canisters and cake pans would not have fit.

I can’t show you pictures because the kitchen is getting ready for sale, but my mother designed her kitchen to have almost all lower drawers in 1970!

It’s a U-shape, with the breakfast nook on the other side of one leg of the U, as was common.

Nook:

That corner of the U that is blind on the kitchen side, but on the nook side has 4 drawers that held napkins, placemats, the crossword and pens, candles, tablecloth, and in time it held vitamins, Rxs, etc. Even the binoculars for watching the birds and deer!

The rest of the U on that side had a top drawer for flatware; a false-front because a drawer behind it opened to the kitchen side of the U, and two lower cabinet doors. One was a cabinet that opened to both sides of the U: cereal on the nook side and casseroles on the kitchen side. The other lower cabinet door was funny, because on the kitchen side it was drawers! They held aprons and towels, so it was handy: if there was a major milk spill during breakfast you could just reach in from the nook side and grab a towel.

There were uppers between the dishwasher and the nook, very convenient for putting away the clean dishware and setting the table.

Kitchen U perimeter:

In the kitchen proper, on the other side from the nook, there was a bank of drawers for the aforementioned towels and aprons, serving implements, and small stainless serving dishes (you know, small, for things like crudités, olives, condiments).

Below the prep area on the end of the U was a wide drawer for spreaders and cooking utensils and measuring cups. The cabinet below that had two pullout shelves. I feel it is the perfect combination. You can open the cabinet and easily grab a pan, or you can pull out the shelves to get the less-often used pans at the back. No nesting of pans in that cabinet, one-hand use. Lids, which really Mom didn’t use every time, were on a vertical file rack inder the cooktop. Handy to grab fast.

Another lower cabinet held bulky appliances like the waffle iron.

A bank of drawers held food wraps, later some gladware, breads and crackers, and all those miscellaneous little things you need like twisties, rubber bands, scissors, but not really a junk drawer.

The uppers between cooktop and fridge held, spices, storage containers, and prep bowls.

Island:

A bank of drawers held baking needs: canisters/jars for dry goods in one, bulky appliances like mixers in the bottom one, and top one for mixing tools.

A lower cabinet had vertical dividers for sheets, oven pans/roasting pans, and shallow bakeware.

The back side of the island had a rolling cart tucked under!

Baking Center:

Two banks of drawers held molds and bulky bakeware like the angel food pan, cookie cutters, a flipper, hot pads, thermometers, while overhead held things like sprinkles, and and, hmm, I can’t remember now, but I think less-used things like jello molds. She called it a baking center but it was more a place to store those things you use only for baking. It was near the oven so it was also the spot for the oven mitts and thermometer.

Mom was very ”function, then form”. Her cabinets were formica, no handles, just a fingernotch at the top or bottom edge. Very easy to clean and keep clean. The whole kitchen was very efficient, which made it handsome as well. She was only 5’ tall so the base cabinets are a bit lower than normal (and yes, that is a problem for the dishwasher. We found a guy who kept it going for 47 years, because replacing it would mean removing the countertop). And, upper cabinets in parts of the kitchen, not in the busiest work areas, are mounted a little lower. At 5’4”, even I appreciate that.

I’ll play. I recently renovated with all drawers for my lowers (except under sink)- and I love it. It makes a huge difference in terms of usable space. I did a standard depth drawer on top with two equal depth drawers below. There are pros/cons to the approach, but it works for me. I’m still settling in and moving things around, but here’s where things stand today… The organizers are things I bought after the fact.

26” next to dishwasher:

- migrating slowly to the bamboo utensil holder

- tried one of the pegboard things to help hold a secondary set of dishes. Kinda ”meh”.

12” flanking stove:

- primary cooking utensils, measuring cups

- pot holders, towels, unopened sponges & such

31” island drawer (opposite stove):

41” by fridge:

And it’s not a drawer, but here’s the pantry (which is about 2steps from the stove and holds the spices, etc.)…and I turned the left part that has a clipped corner due to wall angle in adjacent room into an appliance/etc sotage area.

18" cabinet to the left of the fridge (glassware & mugs are in an upper above).

Just around the corner from my range. I think this is a 30" drawer base.

And another 18 inch base to the right of the range.

I would keep one lower cabinet with vertical dividers for sheet pans, muffin tins and cutting boards, etc. I have an 18" cab solely for those. Right now I'm using an after-market divider to organize but eventually I will build something in. Some people put that over the fridge but it seems too high for me. So, consider how you would prefer to manage those.

I had my cutting boards in a drawer in my last house and decided not to do it that way in this one. I don't like tiny cutting boards and the big ones take up too much drawer space IMO. I'll take pics when I get home for the rest as I'm just getting organized now in my kitchen (moved in 2 weeks ago). But I will say this - it's the perfect time to purge. Most people have too much stuff. Paring down on the things you don't use will be the best organization tip you'll get - especially pots & pans.

Here's a few pics. I have pullout shelves as builder didn't offer all drawer bases but they function similarly for organizing.

Great topic!! I had my galley style kitchen renovated a few years ago. On one side I have 3 bays of 3 sets of drawers; I love my drawers!! I also have 2 pull out drawers inside a cabinet where I store my containers and plastc wrap, plastic bags, waxed paper, etc. Under my coffee station I have 3 sets of drawers where I store silverware in upper drawer, spices in middle drawer and small appliances in bottom drawers.

Continued:

Just moved into a new home. Choosing the cooktop meant two drawers underneath standard. Then I upgraded the cabinets on either side of the cooktop with pull out drawers.

Under the stove, two drawers for cookware.

On either side of the cooktop, two cabinets with pull out drawers

Then I have four really large drawers. I'm still unpacking my pottery; I have a pitcher from Bratislava and an canister from Germany on either side of the stove for my cooking utensils.

And don't forget the hard-working Susan

Store wine in drawers, I don't use dividers, just lay bottles next to and on top of others. Disclaimer: not my drawers below.

I also have a pantry with yet more drawers. I have standard 24" bases on one side but the other side of the 6 ft wide pantry has shallow drawers.

This is not well organized right now.

Neither is this; random snack and school lunch drawer.

My tea drawer

Small appliances

@anj_p: Do you recall where you found the tension dividers with the notches for horizontals? Don’t know that I’ve seen those, but super useful idea!

Here are some of mine

A couple more. Pots and pans are distributed among three long drawers.

@Julie R yes, as I just got it yesterday from Amazon!! They're called SpaceAid and they have a lot of different combinations.

We sold this house a bit over a year ago, and I miss this kitchen my sweet hubby designed and built for me, but here are a few of the drawers he made for me. I wish I had photos of the interior of every drawer. We are in a temporary housing situation right now as we try to build our next home, but we will have as many kitchen drawers as possible in the next one too.

This was the working side of my island, and in the 3 drawers in the middle I had my Tupperware style lids neatly stacked in the bottom drawer, Tupperware style containers neatly stacked in the middle drawer, and different sized ziplock bags and silicone mats in the top drawer. My fridge was behind me as I stood there at the island (also where we served most food) and it was great for putting away leftovers on that location! (And the silicone mats were there to protect my wood countertop from hot dishes, or for under cutting boards and the like.) All of my tin foil, Saran Wrap, and my extra knives were in a drawer behind me and next to my fridge. (And above my drawer that contained cutting boards and cookie sheets in a photo in the comment above.) I displayed my best knives on a magnet strip on the panel by the fridge. It made it all right at my fingertips!

This was the other side of my island, and it also shows more of a layout of how the kitchen was. In these drawers I kept all of my medication and first aid supplies since I take my meds with meals or right before I go to bed... and I’m always in the kitchen right before I head to bed. LOL! The top drawer held my weekly pill box and prescription medications and hubby told me he could put a lock on it (or any drawer) if I wanted him to. I never had him do it, but it was nice to know it would’ve been a doable option if I ever decided I wanted it. I also kept my paper calendar and any urgent paperwork in there. (Stuff that needed handling that week, I tried not to let that get out of hand.) In the drawers below that I kept all kinds of household medications/supplements, bandaids, etc... We had a large family (empty nesters now) and I bought most everything at Costco. I’d write what was in each bottle in sharpie on the top of the lid and it helped us find stuff pretty fast. The bottom drawer held mostly extras (Costco two packs, LOL) and ace bandages... and extra kitchen towels. Hahahaha!

Right smack next to the stove:

In the above photo of my kitchen, to the right of the range that top drawer contained pot holders and my immersion blender. The long drawer to the left of the sink had all manner of spoons, spatulas, measuring cups and spoons... all the stuff I needed to cook and bake with, and it also had dividers like my silverware drawer in a photo above. It was very easy to find stuff and put it away properly, and everything was right at my fingertips and next to where I’d use the other stuff associated with it. (My mixer was right there, and all of my spices were in the cabinet above that, which was also very near my range so I could grab spices while cooking.) My pots and pans, and casserole dishes were in the cabinet below. My skillets were in the bottom drawer to the right of the range and are in a photo above. The set of 3 huge drawers to the right of the sink and dishwasher held my silverware (the drawer is in a photo above) and below that I had dish towels, large bowls for cooking (I showed a toaster in one of the photos in the drawer... but I didn’t end up keeping that there after all and it stayed on the counter) but I didn’t have dividers for the two large bottom drawers. The most bottom drawer had a lot of overflow kitchen stuff and was always my worst organized drawer, but I didn’t need to access it often. Hope that helps explain how it worked for me. That kitchen was organized beautifully once hubby was done making it (he did all of the designing, building, and painting by himself, and it took about a year to complete. I had a functioning kitchen in a mere 2 weeks, but I lived with open wood boxes/slots for storage while he finished building doors and drawers. He also took 3 months off during that build to go on a short term missions trip, finish 2 masters degrees, work full time, and travel with me for one of our son’s sporting competitions. So it didn’t really take a full year to build if you consider that. LOL!) But I was always really proud of his work and how well he listened to how I wanted all of my stuff organized. I miss that kitchen a lot!

Here’s another view of that kitchen so you can see the large drawers we had to the right of the sink and dishwasher. They were really big, like big dresser drawers! I had a small walk in pantry to the left of the fridge. It was more like a step in pantry and we used it’s height to full advantage. But I didn’t keep really anything but food and my broom and mop in there. I had one more freestanding cabinet not shown in any of these pictures that held my less used appliances like my rice cooker and vita-mix blender, but otherwise, this kitchen setup worked fabulously well for our family of 7 and frequent guests!

In our recent renovation we put drawers pretty much everywhere. Similar usage as previous posters. I hadn’t originally considered using it for water bottles - my favourite drawer now - they no longer topple over when you grab one and you can find the one you need easily!!! Kids love it and it’s on the outside side of the island so out of the way. The bottom drawer stores lunch bags.

I have all drawers in my kitchen, and i love an organized drawer. As a heads up, anyone who thought about the RevAShelf peg drawer dividers but didnt love the price, should look to ikea. They have a pretty strong plastic version ($16) if you wanted to try them.

WOW Everyone! I am so impressed with all of your kitchens! Thank you so, so much for showing or describing your real life spaces and how drawers function so well in them. You have given me much to think about before I meet with our cabinetmaker.

@skmom - Your former kitchen was so beautiful and it is so special that your husband made it for you. A true labor of love. I'm sorry you had to leave it behind and I hope your next kitchen will be just as meaningful (and functional) for you.

@nycbluedevil_gw - if you have a moment, would you mind sharing what materials and colors you used for your cabs/island and counters? I love the warmer color scheme you chose. I also love your spice drawer. Beauty comes in many forms!

Thanks again for all the help you've been!

I have total six small drawers in my inside kitchen,

Oops , sorry posted too soon by mistake! Anyway, I have six drawers in my kitchen, three on one side near sink, three on opposite side under work area.

The ones near the sink: 1st drawer has sandwich wrapping paper and tissues/ kitchen towels, 2nd drawer has pan coasters ( nice ones for when guests come), and doilies. 3 rd has sandwich bag boxes of various sizes.

The drawers on opposite side closet to cooker: 1st drawer cutlery just for cooking use etc ( dinner cutlery and guests cutlery) different areas), 2nd drawer has measuring spoons, ice cream scoops and peelers. Last drawer is for larger utensils put aside for serving only.

Cooking utensils are hanging or in utensil holder for quick access near cooker.