Shelves in the kitchen instead of cabinets: features and selection criteria

In recent years, minimalism in the interior has firmly established itself in the positions of one of the leading trends. This option is gladly used by owners of both spacious cottages and small-sized apartments. One of the most effective solutions can be the placement of open shelves instead of a bulky kitchen unit.

In recent years, open shelves in the dining room and kitchen have become a good alternative to the upper sections of kitchen sets, an attempt to move away from existing stereotypes and embody fresh design solutions. The absence of upper cabinets has both its advantages and disadvantages - we will dwell on each of them in more detail. Supporters of the shelves highlight the following advantages of such lightweight options.

• Visual expansion of space. It's no secret that massive kitchen sections take up a lot of space and visually narrow the room. The absence of such piles greatly simplifies the perception - the kitchen looks more spacious and voluminous.
• Improvement of light distribution. Bulky furniture modules, as a rule, impede the movement of the light flux, thereby obscuring individual areas of the kitchen, in particular, the working area. The use of shelves is completely devoid of this drawback, since all areas of the room are illuminated in full. The result is a comfortable environment, and this stimulates all the work processes in the kitchen.
• Saving furniture budget. Shelves will cost the owner of the living space much cheaper than the hinged modular sections, since much more materials are used for the production of cabinets. Accordingly, their cost is higher.
• Speeding up the kitchen environment. Having abandoned cabinets, you will greatly reduce the waiting time for a new kitchen set, this factor is especially relevant for people who move into new housing.
• Ease of care. The openness of furniture greatly facilitates the accessibility of cleaning, in addition, when wet cleaning the shelves dry quickly. While washing closed cabinets, moisture can accumulate, and this helps to create an environment favorable for the growth of mold and fungus. In addition, water causes deformation of materials, which significantly worsens the appearance of the furniture and shortens its useful life.
• Individual appearance of the room.

Despite all the advantages, the rejection of lockers has not yet taken on a massive scale. Proponents of standard furniture point to a number of flaws in open shelves.

• Such designs have less functional capacity than lockers. This minus is especially significant in small kitchens, where you have to fit a lot of things in a small space - it is far from always possible to arrange all utensils in the lower cabinets, so the installation of additional storage systems becomes especially important.
• Over time, the shelves are overloaded and even cluttered. Deficiencies of existing storage systems lead to the fact that suspended structures are jammed with a wide variety of excess items.
• Open shelves are usually subject to a thorough and detailed inspection. - any flaws in style and decor, the costs of cleanliness and integrity of the coating are immediately evident.

The typical design of the shelf is an ordinary crossbar fixed to the wall with the help of holders. However, in practice, there are many other, most diverse and interesting options:

• angular;
• curly;
• inclined;
• concealers.

Shelves can be run from various materials (wood, plastic, metal and even glass), the choice is usually made based on the purpose of the subject and its functionality. So, wooden shelves are considered universal, in most cases, buyers give preference to them. They differ practicality and durability, a wooden shelf is easy to make and fix on your own without resorting to the services of specialists.

Glass models Look very impressive, airy and stylish. Glass transmits light well, the material is easy to clean and does not create difficulties when cleaning. As a rule, for the production of kitchen shelves, not ordinary, but plexiglass is used - independent work with such material is much more difficult than with wood.

Plastic is economical and hygienic, it is an inexpensive and easy to maintain material. The only restriction on the use of such shelves is placement. It is desirable that the structures are hung away from the slab.

Metal shelves look very impressive and stylish. For the kitchen, it is better to choose products that are protected from rust, otherwise the microclimate of the room will quickly spoil their impeccable appearance. It is unlikely that you will be able to work independently with metal, therefore, usually they use ready-made options for shelves.

When designing shelves in the kitchen, they usually use several design solutions.

• Of different depths. This is a great idea, which remotely resembles how they built and equipped houses in medieval cities. Usually, with this approach, the lowermost shelf is made narrow, and all subsequent ones located at the level of human growth are already much wider.Similarly, you can almost double the functional space for storing items at the top.

• The same depth. In this case, the shelves are placed directly above the working area. It is noted that they look much more spectacular if they are suspended from one vertical surface to another, for example, from a wall to a cabinet wall.

• In the corner. If massive shelves are located in the corner, then enough storage space is formed, but at the same time the room will not seem overloaded and dark. Such shelves look quite expensive and stylish.

• With a support on a working surface. This is a rather original solution, allowing you to create a shallow, up to 20 cm wound system. The result is a rack on which several small rectangular shelves are mounted, and it is not necessary that they be the same size. It will be beautiful if you fix on the support shelves of different heights and different sizes.

• With a mirror wall. A very stylish solution, involving open modules with a mirror wall. This solution is optimal for small kitchens and small studio apartments.

• Elongated structures with metal fasteners. Such products are harmonious if the kitchen has low ceilings or there are no long walls along which you can fix the “ruler”.

On the pros and cons of open shelves in the kitchen, see the next video.