It's a matter of personal preference. For me, we had bi-fold doors in our last house and I hated them for the closets at that house. If you have bi-folds make sure that the closets/pantry are deep enough so that nothing in the closet/pantry will be touching the doors as stuff will get stuck in the doors, the doors won't close, etc. If I were to use bi-folds again, I'd make sure that clothes closets were at least 30" deep. At my old house, the closets were only 24" deep and that was a problem--we live in Wisconsin and the sleeves on winter jackets were always getting stuck in the doors. Also, at our old house there was a bi-fold on the linen closet and the door opening was, I think, only 24" wide. The bi-fold door took up at least 6" when open which reduced the useable access to only 18" or less which didn't always work out so well. We have all walk in closets in our new house except for the coat closet by the front door. Instead of using bifolds, we used double regular swinging doors that swing outward and I really like that set up a lot better than bifolds.

I have three walk-in closets and one pantry for which I need lights. They all have junction boxes with switches. My master closet had two junction boxes, husband's has one, son's has one, and pantry one. Can anyone recommend a simple, white, not too traditional flush mount that gives off good light for under $100 (preferably under $75?) I looked at home depot site, not sure where else to look. We looked at Ikea too, but my husband wants something that has more than one bulb for his since he will only have one. Thanks!

I think you are thinking this through well. I would put the deeper shelves in the middle (easier to see and get to). Measure what you want to store in the pantry and make the shelves deep and tall enough for that. I stored lots of can goods in my last pantry (in the boxes they were sold in) that fit on an 11 in deep shelf. My newer pantry had shelves tall enough to use a canned goods storage container that works better. I had shorter shelves for foil and plastic wrap and sandwich bags. I store paper towels on the floor along with grocery bags. We used quality shelving in our pantry and it held up really well.

Thanks so much. FWIW, to the left of the fridge, I want to put the micro in the upper cabinet and the toaster oven below. (so the fridge is scooted to the right. That 6" endcap is for the broom closet, if I can't find another home). But let me re-measure all of that area and see if there is room for the 15" tall cabinet. Always good to revisit. Thank you! The tall shallow pantry cabinet along the bedroom wall--you are astute! I have one there now (5' long) but...even a shorter one at 12" deep would interfere with the flow if we add an island. The current 48" wide aisle could potentially be cut to 42" but then I'd need to lose 6" in the island. (actually, we had debated making the island 4" wider, so I could have storage for books on the W/D side, but decided a 48" aisle might be good. I may still make the island wider). Another issue is that this corridor is in direct view of the front door, so today when I open the door I see that side of that 12" pantry. I'm trying to clean up that sightline and improve the flow. FWIW, I have a 1940 bungalow, so everything is smallish. Thanks so much for all your thoughts. If you have other ideas, I'd love to hear them. ;)