One of the things that gets on my nerves is when space is being wasted simply because I haven’t taken the time to organize it. And before you even question it, yes, organizing makes the most out of space (in most cases, not the “overconsumption” situation you see all over socials).
By organizing our spice drawer, we made the space more useful and functional, giving us more out of our kitchen.
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Why a Spice Drawer?
Well, because after an unwilling kitchen renovation and unwilling den renovation (we only wanted to do the floors, but years of water damage forced our hand), we ended up with more kitchen space but fewer upper cabinets. Since we were still low on counter space, we decided that instead of storing our spices on the wall, we’d keep them in the drawer next to the stove.
The drawer itself was made by us, and while the idea was great, we ran low on budget and time by the end of our kitchen renovation, leaving the ‘spice drawer’ way down on the todo list.
Spice drawers are becoming more and more popular, which meant that there were going to be plenty of hacks, tips, and tricks that would help us utilize the space and make it not so uncomfortable when reaching for what we needed.
The Plan: Spice Drawer Organization
Of course, I went into this with a plan — in fact, most of what I used to organize my drawer has been sitting in my Amazon cart, waiting for the perfect purchase moment.
Here’s what the spice drawer looked like when I started:
I knew I needed more structure to the drawer, more dedicated space for individual spices, and some room for the “larger” spices we buy from Sam’s Club (the bulk/big food store). I wasn’t sure about anything else, but I knew the basics. I really just needed to get the spices from my counter back into the drawer where they belonged.
Before starting, I also opted to get a cabinet liner/drawer liner as I wanted to make sure that if my spice rack didn’t make it all the way to the back of the drawer, it wouldn’t slide. This turned out to be a great decision, as my father-in-law has the same spice rack and that exact problem.
The final shopping list ended up like this:
- Green Plaid Non-Slip Drawer and Shelf Liner
- SpaceAid Spice Drawer Organizer Set of 16
- SpaceAid Bag Storage Organizer
How to Organize a Spice Drawer
I didn’t go into this with an exact plan on where everything was going to fit into the drawer, but I did have a general idea (as you can see by my shopping list). Here’s how you can organize a spice drawer:
I really just went with the flow to see what I could fit and where. I wasn’t aiming for “perfection”; I was aiming for functionality and organization (aesthetically pleasing was a bonus). It worked well that the space above the bag organizer was suitable for the bigger spice containers.
I’m slightly worried about how the spice jars will hold up and if the stickers will stay during a wash cycle, luckily it’s not too bad as replacement labels aren’t expensive or hard to DIY — it’s just annoying.
Let’s look at it even more (because I’m pretty proud of my work):
And, in all honesty, I love it, but dang, was it time-consuming to put all my spices in the spice jars. There was no good or “easy” way to do it. Some were easier than others — anything granulated was simple, and anything powdered was a mess.
In a fun addition, I cleaned up all the spice jars (the plastic ones) that were expired or emptied out into the new jars and put them in my daughter’s play kitchen, and they absolutely loved it! I’ll continue to do so with “restocks” when needed so that nothing goes to waste.
So, what do you think of my spice drawer organization?
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