It’s always a good idea to maximize the space in a kitchen to make it more functional and easier to use. But there’s a space that many of us have that we know is not being used to its full potential, but we don’t quite know how to use it best. And that’s of course the blind corner of your kitchen cabinets.
The space inside blind corner kitchen cabinets can be better utilized using internal mechanism that are specifically designed to help maximize the space inside the cabinet. These mechanisms include:
- Lazy Susan
- Magic Corner
- Le Mans
- Diagonal drawers
Each design will have a different amount of efficient use of space and come with their own set of pros and cons.
Regular corner kitchen cabinets make it difficult to reach anything at the back. And you need to bend down and reach to get these items out. What’s more, the cabinet in the corner is even more difficult and ends up being a bit of a wasted space more often than not.
For this reason, there are now many solutions that both maximize the space in a corner cabinet and make it far more usable. In this article, I’ll explain the different options that are available, and the pros and cons of each of the different options.
Types of Blind Corner in a Kitchen Space
Before getting into each of them it’s important to understand there are two potential ways a blind corner can be laid out. It can be:
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- A blind corner where the corner cabinet has only one door
- A blind corner that has two doors
It’s important to know what type of blind corner you have. I noticed that many expert interior designers use the term blind corner cabinet to mean L-shaped corner cabinets – a regular kitchen cabinet that is or isn’t a blind corner cabinet, and a true blind corner cabinet. So it can be a little confusing when the term is used for different things interchangeably.
However, each of these solutions will work regardless of the specific corner layout you’re thinking about or have.
Here’s a table that shows the different blind corner cabinet options, and which one provides the most usable space:
Type of blind corner cabinet | Rank from most to least space |
---|---|
Magic Corner | 1st |
Lazy Susan | 2nd |
Le Mans Blind Corner Cabinet and similar | 3rd |
Diagonal drawers | 4th |
A Magic Corner utilizes 100% of the space in the blind corner cabinet, whereas, diagonal drawers utilize the least. Another factor is the amount of moving parts in a blind corner solution.
A blind corner solution with the least amount of moving parts is preferred because there are fewer things that can go wrong. Such as needing to lubricate the mechanisms, or replace one of the mechanisms.
Below, is a summary of each of the blind corner shelf solutions, with a rundown of the pros and cons.
The Magic Corner Pull-Out Shelves
Hafele is a large well-known company that makes a wide range of products for homes and offices, such as furniture, sliding walls, and kitchen cabinets. They’ve developed what they call a ‘magic corner’ that is reasonably popular. (There are also many different brands that sell shelves with a virtually identical design).
The Magic Corner only requires one door. So the space to the left or right can be a full shelf. It has two regular shelves when you first open the door. And it has a handle near the top that you pull out.
When you pull it out the first row of shelves comes completely out of the cabinet and comes to rest to the side. At the same time, the shelves in the corner slide all the way across into the position where the first set of shelves were.
The Magic Corner utilizes all of the space in a corner cabinet. The drawback of a magic corner that is has the most moving parts. This means there are more things that can break. Unlike the diagonal drawer, or Lazy Susan.
The Lazy Susan
A Lazy Susan is a classic tried and tested corner cabinet solution. It is a very simple design, and there are many kitchen cabinets that are slight modifications of a Lazy Susan. It works best with a two-door blind kitchen cabinet. The key feature of a Lazy Susan is the two shelves are a circular shape.
They rotate completely 360 degrees, or can be turned part way enough that the back of the shelf is in the front. It’s very easy to use. The one drawback of a Lazy Susan is there is a small amount of space lost in the corners, due to the circular shape. But overall, it’s a very solid choice for a blind corner kitchen cabinet.
Lazy Susan With Rotating Doors
When you open a blind corner cabinet with Lazy Susan shelves, the doors will be in the way. This is because the doors can either open 90 degrees to the cabinet opening, or can slide all the way across and out of the way. Or, open most of the way. There are some issues with this:
- Doors that open 90 degree – it’s more difficult to access and is a tighter opening
- Doors that slide across – some space is lost to accommodate the door in the open position, making it tighter and more awkward to access
- Doors that open all the way – You need to be careful not to damage the front of the other cabinets when you open the doors
All of these are solved by using a Lazy Susan with rotating doors.
In the closed position, a Lazy Susan with rotating doors looks like a normal kitchen cabinet. But when you open it, the doors rotate with the Lazy Susan Shelves. So when the back of the shelves are rotated to the front, the doors are located at the back of the cabinet.
Half Moon Lazy Susan
A half-moon Lazy Susan is the same as a regular Lazy Susan, except it’s only one-half of the circular shape, rather than the ¾ circle that a regular Lazy Susan has.
When you open the one door, the half-moon pulls out. The back, hard-to-reach part, is at the cabinet opening and the front quarter of the half-moon Lazy Susan comes completely out of the cabinet. This allows easy access to the back.
Le Mans Blind Corner Cabinet Pull Out
The Le Mans blind corner cabinet pull-out has shelves that are ‘peanut-shaped’. The reason for the shape is to allow the shelf to pull out almost completely. It has two shelves one at the bottom, and one halfway up.
They provide really good access to anything in a blind corner cabinet. The minor drawback is that because of the shape, they have slightly less storage than a magic corner.
However, the shelves aren’t in two parts, making it simpler and more minimal than a magic corner. The shape of the shelves provides a contrast to the straight lines and grid-like look of a kitchen, which can add some interest to the design of your kitchen.
Blind Corner Diagonal Drawers
Base corner drawers are drawers that open towards you. They open out from the midpoint of a corner. The outside has a design that looks like two separate drawers that open both ways.
Base corner drawers make it very easy to access whatever is inside the drawers. The one drawback is that they are not the most space-efficient. About ⅓ of the space in the entire corner is lost because of the design.
Another option to maximize space is to make the cabinets on either side of the blind corner drawers have a diagonal wall. This means the cabinets on either side have an area that is a little bit more difficult to access. But, this is made up by the fact the blind corner diagonal drawers are so easy to access.
Another advantage of blind corner diagonal drawers is they have very few moving parts. Therefore, there are fewer points of failure that can require a full cabinet refit. They are simply regular drawers, unlike other blind corner solutions that have multiple mechanisms, and sliding components.
Diagonal Drawers Press To Open
A very cool, almost ‘space-age’ take on diagonal drawers is to install them with press-to-open latches. When you press on the drawer it slides open. Then to close it you press it all the way closed, and press it firmly to keep it closed. This feature can be added to the diagonal drawers mentioned above.