Three vs Four drawers for kitchen cabinets

[Roger Jensen]

I'm building cabinets for our kitchen and we're trying to decide on three vs. four drawers on the lower cabinets. With only four drawers they are pretty shallow, even with one inch FF rails between them. However, most cabinets I see in pictures use four.

Just curious what other folks think. I'm using Blum Tandom full extension sliders, so getting to the back of the drawer isn't an issue.

Thanks,

Roger

[Matt Meiser]

I did 2, 3, and 4 at my parents'. 4 is three standard height drawers and one slightly deeper. That cabinet 12" wide and will be used for dish cloths and a number of other small items. I think the botton is going to be the mandatory "junk drawer." 3 is a standard drawer and 2 deeper drawers in a 24" cabinet. The deeper drawers will be used for dishes. And 2 is a 24" wide cabinet with 1/3 in the top and 2/3 in the bottom that will be used for pots and pans.

We have a 4 in our own kitchen which works well for silverware, dish cloths, placemats, etc.

I guess what I'm saying is that it depends what you want to put in them. Since you are building it for yourself, think about how you will use the space and tailor it to fit your needs. A future owner can find a way to make them work for their needs or rip them out and put in particle board ones from the BORG.

[Jamie Buxton]

It may depend on what you think you're going to be storing in those drawers. Flatware and placemats work well in shallow drawers. Cooking utensils and aluminum foil and such also go well in shallow drawers. Pots and cooking dishes and food packages generally want a deeper drawer.


BTW, I'm a big fan of using only drawers in the base cabinets. Putting doored areas in the base cabinets means you're going to down on your hands and knees trying to find the stuff that is on the lower shelf in the back. Using drawers gives you much easier access to the airspace in the bottom rear of the cabinet.

[Eric DeSilva]

BTW, I'm a big fan of using only drawers in the base cabinets. Putting doored areas in the base cabinets means you're going to down on your hands and knees trying to find the stuff that is on the lower shelf in the back. Using drawers gives you much easier access to the airspace in the bottom rear of the cabinet.

Or, at a minimum, pull outs for base cabinets w/doors...

[Jamie Buxton]

Or, at a minimum, pull outs for base cabinets w/doors...

I've never been able to figure out pull-outs. To get at something, you first open the doors, and then you pull out the pullout/drawer. That's two motions. If you have drawers, you just pull them open. It seems to me that's more convenient.

[Kevin Groenke]

I've never been able to figure out pull-outs. To get at something, you first open the doors, and then you pull out the pullout/drawer. That's two motions. If you have drawers, you just pull them open. It seems to me that's more convenient.

I was frustrated by door/pull-out redundancy too Jamie.

I resolved the issue by attaching the door front to the bottom pull-out. There is still some redundancy if jou just need something off of the the top pull-out but it least the action is in the same direction. It seems that we're usually grabbing something off of both pull-outs when we're in there anyway. Pushing the door front in closes both pull-outs.

-kg

[Bill Arnold]

I've never been able to figure out pull-outs. To get at something, you first open the doors, and then you pull out the pullout/drawer. That's two motions. If you have drawers, you just pull them open. It seems to me that's more convenient.

Well, pull-outs can make you 'the king' in some situations. Kinda like in this thread. LOML is still bragging on me to anyone who will listen.

Having said that, if one is building all new cabinets, drawers are the way to go.

[Roger Jensen]

I am making inset drawers and my face frames have 1 inch rails and 1 1/2 inch stiles. How deep are your top drawers? I was going to use 5 3/4 inch deep, but perhaps that is too deep.

The reason I ask is that it doesn't leave much space to allocate different size drawers below when doing four drawers. Everything is around 6 1/2 inches.

[Mark P. Miller]

Just my opinion...I think that it just depends on what you intend to store in that location. I had my wife really think about how she wanted to organize her kitchen, and when it came down to it, she decided that a 3-drawer bank would work best for her specific case.