Some small apartments don't have separate kitchens, but rather small kitchenettes in the corner of the living or dining room. Your typical upper cabinets in this situation can sometimes be an eyesore. So how to store your dishes and pantry items? You might consider turning a coat closet into a pantry...
Most coat closets are pretty well suited to a pantry conversion (and reversion if you're renting): simply remove the hanger bar and hang wall-mount shelving (Elfa, for instance). Now, your kitchen storage is hidden away from your living room and the wall in your kitchenette can be given over to curated open shelving or even artwork!
"Hey, what about my coat closet!?", you ask? Your own coats can be hung on hooks at the door or in your bedroom closet. And when entertaining, guests' coats are often laid out on the bed in the bedroom, anyway. In the case of my own apartment, there are two closets near the entry and kitchenette, so it was a no-brainer to convert one to a pantry. Electricity was added for the microwave and an overhead light, food storage and dishes are all in there on shelves. The only things out in the open are items I don't mind seeing from the living room.
So, think it over: if your closet is located properly and you can give up coat storage, the closet-turned pantry just might be a solution for you.
Image: Jeff McNamara / Real Simple
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What is the setup on the door? Are they shoe holders? Please let me know...this is fantastic.
cool idea
I do this! I had to in my last apartment, the kitchen was big enough to hold plates, pots, etc, but not food! The linen closet was right there, so I used a couple shelves for laundry stuff and extra towels, the rest became the pantry.
When I moved I did the same thing, although the location isn't as convenient. Maybe I should figure out how to get that stuff back in the kitchen...
The problem with those tiny apartments is usually that storage space is critically scarce, for food or for clothing... If you store the food in the closet, where will you hang you clothes and all the other unsightly stuff that you usually "hide" in the closet? :¬(
Oops, so sorry!... Hasty/lazy me, I hadn't read the whole post; take that back.
I had to do this in my loft. We have 2 upper cabinets. Just 2. Just enough for dishes and that's it. Theres cabinets under the sink, but thats gross for food, and a tiny narrow one next to the fridge. So I got some steel shelves from Ikea and put 2 in front of each other to go the depth of the closet, then there's enough space next to the shelves for the mop and broom.
I'm lucky my boyfriend is clever, we have a support pole right next to the staircase and there's a gap large enough to fit a person between the pole and the wall that makes up the stairs. So we hung hooks on the wall and there's space behind this huge pole for shoe racks.
For us, this arrangement works well and was cheap. A friend that lives in the same building bought a little wardrobe from Ikea and put it in his living room. That's where they keep food that doesnt fit in the cabinets.
My sister does the over the door shoe holder for her kids snacks, and she told me she got the idea from a magazine a few years ago. I wish I could do this in my own home, but unforuntately my only spare closet available is filled with my winter coats.
We usto have a pantry closet just like this, we decided to change it to a stacked washer/dryer unit that was well worth it!
Now we have 2 laundry rooms, but we will turn the pantry back when we plan to sell the house. Thanks for the picture so now I know what will look enticing to the eye.
They do look like shoe holders... clever idea!
we have this in our apartment. i didnt even need to take the clothes rod out, i just went to home depot and got coated wire closet shelves cut to fit
I think that is a shoe holder, but you can actually get an official door holder here:
http://www.improvementscatalog.com/product/8-shelf-pantry-door-racks.do
i have one of the shoe holders hung in my a/c & hot water heater closet, which is in my kitchen. in it i store all of my occasionally used jarred items, obscure spices, and duplicates of items i got on sale, so i don't have to go into it constantly. but that small space is just the perfect size for a shoe holder inside the door.
We did this, but not because we didn't have enough cabinets. We wanted to get rid of our upper cabinets on one wall of the kitchen, so our new 'pantry closet' took the place (and then some) of our lost storage.