The Vertical Pull-Out Spice Drawer: Genius Invention or Waste of Space?

In the endless quest to find the best organization hacks and storage solutions, I often get asked about the vertical pull-out spice drawer when I do kitchen renovation plans. People see these devices on Pinterest or in cabinet maker showrooms and wonder if they are the dream solution they've been waiting for. I have a standard response to those questions but figured it was best to pull my thoughts into something more organized.

To all my friends out there who desperately need a functional solution for your spice storage, I hear you. Today I will be discussing the merits of the vertical pull-out spice drawer. Buckle Up.

What Are Pull-Out Spice Racks?

For those of you who aren't sure what I'm talking about, the vertical pull-out spice rack is the approximately 9" wide full-height drawer that would go in your lower kitchen cabinetry, typically found directly beside your slide-in range. The promise of this device is that it will house your spices and cooking oils so that they are easily reachable when you're cooking up fabulous meals on the stove.

Here is a typical example of one shown here by Aya Kitchens, in the Toronto area.

Why You Should Think Critically Before Choosing a Vertical Pull-Out Spice Drawer in your Renovation Planning Process

Given the huge amount of time we spend in our kitchens, it's really important to make each decision about layout and cabinetry with all of the information, strategy, and pros and cons before you choose to implement something. Just because something is trendy and you saw it in a kitchen showroom doesn't mean it's a practical kitchen storage solution.

You also really need to identify how you, specifically, will use each particular element and if it's right for you.

In the case of vertical pull-out spice drawers, you need to ask yourself how much and how often you use spices in your cooking, and where would be the most convenient place for those spices to live for the easiest daily or maybe only weekly access.

How We Access Our Spices

At our house, we cook at home every single day and use our spices daily as well. We haven't renovated our house yet (with little kids aged one and three, it is not the right time for us to renovate) so this is our current setup.

We have our spices in the upper cabinet directly beside our range hood vent.

This cabinet is above our single, tiny work surface that is our only usable prep space. (Don't get me started on why old kitchen layouts just don't work.)

This is the best place for our spices for now because:

1. Most of our recipes use our spices as a marinade or as a mixture that needs to be put together during the prep phase. What this means is that the person using the spices is not typically standing in front of the stove, mid-stir, frantically searching for the cumin while the smoked paprika is starting to get smokier. We access our spices in the calm pre-cook part of the routine, and so for us, it's actually more important that the spices are close to our prep space instead of the stove.
2. Of course not all meals are like that. Sometimes we do need access to the spice collection while we're actually cooking. I sprinkle dried herbs directly into a simmering pot of spaghetti sauce, so we still find it handy to have the spices close to the stove. For these scenarios, the adjacent cabinet works well for us too.
3. My husband is tall. At 6'3, he has a great view of all the spices in our cabinet and enjoys using them. And I can just see the lid labels when I get up on my tippy toes. We avoid awkward bending and know exactly where everything is.
   
   

The Problems With Most Under-Counter Spice Drawer Cabinets

Vertical Pull Out Spice Cabinets Are Too Narrow to Fit All Your Spices on the Top Row

If the drawer is only 6 - 9" wide, as are most of these seem to be, then the biggest problem is that it will be almost impossible to fit all your spices on the top row. If you use the little bags (these will definitely fall out through the sides) or the little bottles (get ready for all the jingle sounds as they bang each other and fall over every time you open the drawer, they are still not all going to fit on that top row. And once your spices need to spread to another row...

It's Difficult to Access the Items on the Lower Shelves

Once you start spreading your spices out over multiple rows, it's absolutely game over for me. How are you supposed to see what's on each of the lower shelves without bending over awkwardly, with your face now right in the cooking oil splash zone? By being a single narrow pull-out spice drawer instead of multiple regular drawers, the benefits and functionality of the drawer have been lost for all rows except the top. What a pain!

You Can't Access the Narrow Pull-Out Spice Drawer Quickly When You're in a Hurry.

The promise of these drawers is that they not only house your spices, but also your cooking oils and vinegars, etc. With the drawer being this narrow, you would need to be so careful when you pull it out because tall, skinny, glass bottles are definitely going to fall over with a rushed pull. Can you imagine how often you'll be opening this drawer, both for the spices and the cooking oils? We use our olive oil every single day multiple times, and not just when we're cooking on the stove. Our olive oil would clank and smash on a daily basis.

You should never need to tiptoe around your kitchen because its primary goal should always be to provide function. A vertical spice drawer just doesn't offer the function it promises.

Spices and Oils Have Different Heights

A typical kitchen's collection of spices and cooking oils will have a lot of different heights, which makes organizing such a skinny drawer difficult. In order to have your most-used things together in the most reachable spot probably means you should have your main cooking oil up on the top drawer row with your most-used spices. Since spice jars tend to be short, there will be a lot of wasted vertical space in that first shelf. In addition, you'll probably need two rows like this, but probably won't have room for a third row. The result? You may not even have room for the spices and oils you actually use, rendering this well-intentioned pull-out spice drawer completely useless.

What to Use Instead of the Lower Cabinet Vertical Pull-Out Spice Drawer

I don't mind having our spices in an upper cabinet for now, but my recommendation is to just put them in a regular horizontal top drawer. Depending on the size of your spics jars, you can get an appropriately deep drawer to fit your containers and have them all easily accessible.

Also remember that this drawer does not have to be immediately beside your stove. Really consider how and when you use your spices for cooking and make a decision that makes sense for your cooking lifestyle. If you BBQ 90% of the time and use your spices for sauces and meat rubs, then having them live closer to your prep area might be more useful. If you rarely use spices at all, then maybe just having them in your pantry a few steps away is fine.

In Summary: Should You Plan Your Kitchen Renovation with a Vertical Pull-Out Spice Drawer?

If you only take away one important lesson from this article, make it this: When planning your dream kitchen renovation, you need to figure out what will make your space most functional for you. Don't implement trendy or fashionable "solutions" just because a cabinet manufacturer tells you to buy it. The vertical pull-out spice rack is one of those classic examples that sound great initially, but once you start using it, you find it to be disappointing and not functional for your home. Standard drawers, though a little more expensive overall, are really the way forward for your most functional home.

If you have a very narrow space left over in your lower cabinets, I highly recommend a solution like this instead of trying to house your spices.