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Open shelves are a great idea if dust did not exist. I have them in my (rental) kitchen and they are a nightmare.
High up on a kitchen wall is NOT where you want open shelves.

I'd like to politely disagree with ValHalla. We have open shelving in our kitchen and I love it. We keep all of our plates, bowls and glasses on the open shelves and have hooks underneath for pots and pans. Sure, we have to wipe the shelves down more than we would if they were enclosed, but the shelves do have some great advantages. Having to display everything is a good incentive to cut down on the amount of stuff we have. If you have to keep food up there, try investing in nice looking containers (like the square glass ones from IKEA), and put things like pasta and rice in them. Open shelves are very easily accessible and give the kitchen a more open and airy feeling.

agreed with ValHalla!!

i like the idea... in theory. but we have it above our stove. the falling oil spits and grime that flies into the air when cooking lands on the shelves, the plates, the pans, the glassware. there is little other space for this things to placed in so we are resigned to washing and rewashing things if they get to gross to use.

Ha. Loved this issue of House Beautiful because.......the front cover matches the colors of my living room, lolol. I felt funny for a long time because I went with the seafoam loveseat and deep blue chair and nobody I know has that color combination. So when I got this issue in the mail, I was totally jazzed.

As far as shelves in the kitchen go, I have cabinets and I hate them. I would totally love to get rid of them and maybe put one shelf up to replace them. I'm short so upper cabinets are a total pain.

Another benefit I've found of open shelves is that they can actually make your kitchen look tidier. There is so much visual action going on that the eye is distracted from any mess or clutter on the benchtops. At least this is what I found in my last house, where the kitchen had open shelves.

Whereas in my current house, with cabinets, if you leave so much as a cake fork out on the bench the kitchen looks messy.

I echo ValHalla's comment: open shelves would be a nightmare in my apartment. I really think that unless you have superb ventilation in your kitchen and a full-time housekeeper, this is an idea best left to editorial spreads.

Hate open kitchen shelving... you can't just store coffee filters or boxes of herb tea or Melitta one-mug cones in the same cupboard as coffee cups unless you "invest" in stylish tins to make everything match. So either you have an inefficient kitchen due to the need to hide things that don't match, or you "invest" a lot of time and money in ways to do the hiding.

Yeah, open shelving isn't such a good idea in earthquake country! #31 is a great idea though, I totally do this. Supermarket flowers are so cheap and include nice things - just not combined in a way I would choose, so I buy them and split them up.