When planning your kitchen renovation, the question about what to do with the corners is usually a contentious one. Shelves? Lazy Susan? Lemans? or just kill it? Here’s a look at the pros and cons of each:
1. Shelves can be a cost effective and simple solution to corner storage and can be integrated into a true corner cabinet or a blind cabinet. Some people choose to use the cabinet floor for the majority of their storage and use a half shelf to make access easier. Shelves are solid, stable and can hold kitchen items of just about any size, shape or weight. The downside to shelves is that once yo
u fill them, the stuff at the back, under the hals shelf, is almost impossible to get at without removing items from the front (it can also be taxing on your knees and back when trying to get at things). Corner cabinets with shelves can quickly become graveyards for items that don’t get used very often or that should be thrown out. If you are going to use shelves in your corner cabinet, you will need to put some thought into how you organize the contents.
2. Lazy Susan’s have been around for years and are available in a number of different materials and configurations. You can get plastic shelves, wood shelves or metal shelves. You can get a pac-man style Lazy Susan for piano door cabinets or you can get full circles for angled corner cabinets. Some Lazy Susan inserts have posts that run from top to bottom through the shelves, while others have a hidden half shelf and use a ball bearing system to rotate. Regardless of which style or configuration you choose, a Lazy Susan is a good way to organize a decent amount of kitchen storage so that it can be accessed as required. The bigges
t complaint about the Lazy Susan is that they often lose items in the back corner that fall of the shelves when rotating. It is always best to use a Lazy Susan for items that are lower in height and that carry a bit of weight. I would caution you against using a Lazy Susan for cereal as there is nothing worse than trying to clean up a spill at the back of the cabinet!
3. The Lemans Corner is a relatively newcomer on the kitchen scene. It is a peanut shaped double shelving unit that seamlessly glides in and out of a blind base cabinet to bring the contents out for access. Lemans corners are very convenient and save you the hassle of bending down and reaching in to find what you are looking for. Because the entire unit pulls completely outside of the cabinet, they are also very easy to clean and items that fall off the back are easier to retrieve (easier tha
n a Lazy Susan). The peanut shape does limit the storage somewhat because the shelf is narrow in the middle, but there is still a decent amount of space if you manage it properly. Lemans corners are a little bit more money than shelving or a Lazy Susan, but they do allow you to use a blind base which gives you more room for functional cabinets in your kitchen.
4. If you have a large kitchen with plenty of room for storage, you may want to consider killing the corners so that they are not accessible at all. It may sound strange to do this, but because corner cabinets are usually the most expensive and difficult to use cabinets in your kitchen, it can be quite liberating to say goodbye to them! Killing the corners also gives you an opportunity for larger cabinets and the straight runs so that the amount of functional space that you loose is minimal.
Regardless of which solution you choose for the corners in your kitchen, there are a number of important factors to consider.