Open shelving can be a great opportunity to add a lot of personality to a space, especially in a kitchen. It can also be a quick way for a room to feel chaotic. Striking a balance between beautiful and functional can sometimes feel like a narrow target.
We added three large open shelves during our kitchen renovation. We did two smaller shelves on either side of the sink, and one nice big long one across the full length of the wall on top. The thing is, decorating a really long shelf like our top one can be a challenge.
If you’re looking for ideas on how to style open shelving in your kitchen, I hope these tips can serve as a helpful guide!
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Set Aside the Time
It may seem silly to set aside time just to decorate a shelf. With a busy life it can seem like the least important thing in the entire world (and may in fact not be the best use of your time). On the other hand styling can be a good excuse to get creative and have some fun, but you need to give yourself the time and space to lean into it. Even as a profession stylist these big shelves took me a few hours to get right. I was grateful I had cleared a whole afternoon to let myself fully enjoy the process and not feel rushed. It served as a bit of a form of self care for me.
Allowing yourself time to be freely creative can be important to your mental health, so don’t brush off the idea too quick. Obviously, if you’re busy, you’re busy! Styling a shelf is by no means a high priority, so maybe just throw some stuff up there and call it a day until you have the time to give yourself to enjoy it. It’s not worth stressing about how it looks, it’s just a shelf!
Organize Your Options
Having all your styling options front and center will make your life so much easier. I like to pull anything and everything I think there’s even an off chance I may use to style all into a central space. I used our kitchen island and dining room table to spread everything out on. You may think that you don’t need to pull everything out and make an extra mess, but i assure you that you’ll appreciate having everything laid out right in front of you.
I also like to take an extra minute or two to swiftly organize colors or textures together. Don’t get too distracted by this, it doesn’t need to be perfect organization, you really just want to have a general idea of what colors and textures you’re working with. Use this process to easily weed out any pieces that feel disconnected from the rest. You may find that you only have one thing in bright red, while everything else is in neutrals, so you may decide to remove it from the group before you even get started.
Start with What You Know
Likely you have some idea of one or two things you want on your shelf. Whether it’s something functional you know you need there, or just something special to you that you want to see everyday, those are the best pieces to start with.
For me, I knew I wanted my mixer in the corner under my shelves. I also have a cake stand that matches my mixer, so I knew I wanted to use that to repeat that color. I stuck the cake stand on the opposite side of the upper shelf. Since I was working with a mostly neutral palette I tried to balance where I placed more colorful items, avoiding clumping them together. If you have a more colorful palette you may even want to experiment with grouping items together by color (Martha Stewart is always a queen at this!).
Balancing Beauty and Function When Styling Kitchen Open Shelves
There are some things on my shelf that are purely decorative. They bring me joy and I just like seeing them, and that’s okay! But I also knew I wanted my shelves to serve me practically too. My two lower shelves that are easy to grab from I made sure to actually add useful items.
Above my mixer are my canisters of baking goods (sugar, baking soda, etc) as well as my collection of mixing bowls. The canisters and bowls have all been thrifted over the years – you don’t need to run out and drop a ton of money for brand new pretty kitchen tools. Thrift stores are often overflowing with vintage glassware that’s actually functional. I use my mixing bowls almost daily, so it’s been useful having them close at hand. Plus I love seeing them because they’re so lovely!
My top shelf I used for more decorative items, as well as items I use more rarely. Items like cake stands and serving bowls I typically only pull out for parties or entertaining. Be thoughtful of where you place items you do use regularly, you don’t want them to be hard to reach if you’re grabbing for them on a semi regular basis.
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