In Praise of Vertical Storage!

I am forever and always preaching to my clients the value of vertical storage - especially in small spaces. And you can't get much smaller than our kitchen! I remember the first night we spent in our home I was hit with severe buyers remorse because I didn't have a large, open format kitchen. However, over time I figured out the perfect place to hang my beloved Taylor & Ng pot rack and eventually grew to appreciate the efficiency of having a small kitchen. I'm literally two steps away from everything I need, and I only own what I need and use!

Last month, my appliance repairman Tony pronounced my 1980s Montgomery Wards stove officially broken beyond repair. If anyone knows this stove, it's Tony. He's been keeping it limping along for almost ten years. If fact, he wouldn't even come over to see the ailing stove. Over the phone he told me, save your money. Even if I went to the ends of the earth to fix the oven, they no longer make the parts. Go buy a new one.

So I did. And of course, because we've been cooking on a crappy stove all these years, our new stove is AMAZING! My son and I now marvel at how fast water boils and how evenly things roast. We're sold!

The only thing that wasn't working for me was the huge gap between the back of the new stove and the wall. Our old stove sat closer to the wall and had a ledge on top that I used for our salt and pepper grinders. The new stove has no ledge, and a much bigger gap. So I called on Gerardo, my intrepid handyman to create a shelf that would block things from falling behind the stove and also give me easy access to all my herbs and spices. (Side note: Since he was here. I also had Gerardo relocate the paper towel dispenser to the sink side of the kitchen.)

I described what I wanted to Gerardo, he went into my garage, and emerged with a shelf that he had removed when he was retrofitting the cabinetry above the new refrigerator. Apparently I had told him to take it away and he refused, thinking that it might come in handy some day. He was right!

Here's what it looks like now! My herbs and spices are in one location instead of one set on the counter and one set in a cupboard. My counter is clear, and it only cost me an hour of Gerardo's time. It also looks like it's always been like that. And once again, it's vertical storage for the win!