I have shared with all of you how much I (we) enjoy cooking and entertaining family and friends. I also love plating and food presentation, so over the years I have accumulated quite a few dishes.
It is always a challenge figuring out how to store so many dishes in a relatively small kitchen. I don’t have many cabinets and I use most of them for pantry use (we do not have a stand alone pantry closet). I keep some dishes in the dining room hutch, but the majority reside in the kitchen cabinets.
Here is how I store and organize my dishes.
I have also collected quite a few glasses over the years. I keep most of them in the dining room hutch.
Below are the ones we use daily. The goblets are inexpensive and sturdy; they are Libbey brand and you can find them HERE. I have also seen them at Marshalls and Homegoods. The smaller tumblers are not as sturdy but they are inexpensive and I love the size. They are from CB2 and you can find them HERE.
All the other white plates are from different stores that I have collected over years.
A pet peeve of mine is stacked plates. It’s not a big deal if they are plates that you seldom use, but your everyday plates should be easily accessible. You shouldn’t have to lift salad plates to get the dinner plates on a daily basis.
I have cabinet dividers and risers in almost every cabinet to maximize the space and to make my dishes easily accessible.
The metal divider/shelf below is from Target. You can find some white ones “here”. Walmart and Homegoods also have a good selection of cabinet organizers.
I do have some colorful dishes but 90% of them are white. I think that food looks better on white plates. I also love that I don’t have to worry about them matching. Plates that I bought last week match the ones that I purchased 15 years ago.
I love cool plates like these concave ones. By sliding the shelf against the cabinet, I made space for these narrow plates.
Most of my drawers hold serving platters. These are too big to fit in my cabinet. They are perfect in the drawer.
In this drawer I keep the bowls that we use most often.
Organizing is an art! This is a standard size drawer and I was able to fit quite a few serving dishes by playing around with placement.
I love opening a drawer where everything has it’s place and is not shifting all over the place. Because all these plates fit in here so tight, there is no room to budge. As Martha would say – “That’s a good thing.”
The bottom drawer is the deepest. In here I keep all the clear baking dishes.
As you can see, I rarely buy dish “sets”. I prefer to buy them separately so that I get exactly what I want. I may love a plate but dislike the coffee cups that come with them in the set.
I want to leave you with some good tips for building your plate and platter collection:
- Get rid of plates and cups that you no longer like or use. We sometimes keep things in our cabinets that we don’t even like, instead of making space for something we truly enjoy.
- If you only want or have one set of plates, make them accessible by placing them on a removable shelf riser. This will double your space!
- If you buy plates separately like me, it is best to buy 9 if you need 8. That way if one breaks, you still have a full set. If two break…well…try not to break two!
- Take your time buying dishes. It is fun to collect things that you love over time, instead of buying things that are on sale to fill up a cabinet.
I hope you enjoyed these ideas because I really enjoyed sharing them with you!
Tell me – do you collect plates too or is one set more than enough?
Always Organizing,
Maria
Organizational Specialist says
Love the fact that you have bottom drawers instead of cabinets! Such a beautifully organized space!
Maria says
Thank you! 🙂