Farmhouse Pantry Overhaul

It’s here! The post we’ve all long anticipated! Our Clean Eats Kitchen pantry reveal! I am so excited to share this space with you! When we started renovating our kitchen I was so hesitant about knocking down a wall and turning our previous office, aka junk room into a walk-in pantry! I thought we would be doing ourselves a disservice by removing a functional room and replacing it with food storage, boy was I wrong. This is easily the best decision we’ve made during this entire process. Which by the way… STAY TUNED our full kitchen reveal is coming up next!!

Our previous corner pantry was a disaster. Absolutely ZERO organization. As hard as I tired, it never seemed to work, I knew we needed something more functional with this space. The layout itself gave us the biggest headache, so many decisions. By this point my brain hurt and I gave my husband the green light to run with it. Once we had dimensions set in stone, the rest was a breeze. The upper shelves are 12 inches deep and 15 inches tall and the bottom are 16 inches deep and 13 inches tall. This allowed us room to store larger items on the bottom out of sight, and the items we use daily up top. I would highly recommend purchasing your bins beforehand and then building out your space based on their dimensions. Most bins we found were 12 and 16 inches deep.

We used Benjamin Moore White Dove paint throughout the entire space to brighten it up and rather than touch up all the demo mess on the sheetrock, we put up shiplap to give it a clean finish and save us from days of patch work. Win win. This was my idea. Sneaky.

I knew I couldn’t do this project alone, so I brought in Tracy Bowers with Organize Simply. Tracy is a certified contained home organizer with The Container Store and the best in the biz. She came into my home, assessed the situation, shopped for needed accessories and got to work! Fortunately The Container Store was having their kitchen sale and we snagged everything at 25% off! I also planned ahead and bought a bunch of clear bins through Amazon. You can find oodles of bins and storage baskets at Home Goods, Walmart and TJ Maxx too if you dig hard enough. I suggest shopping around and grabbing a variety of items, you can always return what you don’t use.

Pantry tips from Tracy…

• PULL EVERYTHING OUT and start with a fresh palette. This was a disaster and I admit I questioned her a bit at first, but it made the most sense and everything went back in an orderly fashion.
• REMOVE all of your packaging. Boxes take up unnecessary space. Plus having your food items in clear containers makes it so much easier to access before going to the grocery store, which in the long run saves you money! (be sure to mention that to your husband when you show him the organization budget)
• ORGANIZE by section. Baking, breakfast, dinner, pasta and snacks ect. When items have a place of their own they are utilized more and wasted less.
• LABELS on closed bins. I was able to add so much extra unseen storage that just looked messy and cluttered in our previous pantry.

ARE YOU READY to see it? Drum roll please….

Come on in. We decided to do a black door to tie in the matte back accents in the kitchen and I LOVE IT!!!! My husband designed it and had it custom made locally. We purchased the hardware on Amazon (sold out) for under $100. Similar linked here. Total cost was around $500.

Isn’t she pretty? My jaw still drops everytime I walk by.

I love the designated space for snacks, nuts, seeds, dinner items, breakfast, pasta, rice and dried beans. Such a game changer.

These glass canisters with oak lids are EXTRA. Mixing in natural woods with the clear plastic canisters really adds warmth to your space.

My adorable neighbor created these beautiful labels for us. She is 15 and beyond talented! You can find her work @carlicreates on Instagram. Thank you Carli!

Snacking made easy. Maybe too easy haha. My kids and all of their friends are huge fans of this snack space. They pack their own lunches daily and are allowed to grab two snacks. Any other snacking throughout the day is from the refrigerator snack drawer (fresh fruits, veggies, dips, cheese, meat stick, HB eggs ect).

I highly recommend the “Expand A Shelf” for canned goods. It’s pretty and uber functional!

Our favorite Miss Jones Bakes has her very own shelf! I leave all the baking up to her… and my kids. Up top is for baking goods, specialty sugars and flours ect and below our pancake station, fully stocked with Kodiak cakes of course.

The Costco door was my husbands idea and I PRAISE HIM for it daily! We can unload our groceries straight from the trunk to the pantry. Genius right? We also had this door custom made locally. Most door shops will know what you mean when you request a “Costco door”. They just cut down a regular door to fit your space. We added a touch keypad lock for easy access with full arms. Similar linked here.

Lots of extra storage bins for all the ugly stuff. below. I snagged these from IKEA. They stack beautifully and were super inexpensive! You can dress them up with cute labels too!

Well… that’s a wrap! Thanks for stopping by! Leave me a comment with any questions you might have!  You can shop The Container Store sale until midnight April 1st online and in store until March 31st.

Pantry products we used…

Good Grips 10 piece POP Canister Set

LARGE Hogla Baskets with handles

SMALL Water Hyacinth Baskets

LARGE Artisan Glass Canister Oak Lid 

MEDIUM Artisan Glass Canister Oak Lid

SMALL Artisan Glass Canister Oak Lid

3.4 qt POP Medium Cereal Container

MEGA Expand A Shelf for baking goods

Expand A Shelf for canned goods

Bin Clip Labels

Chalkboard Labels Stickers

MDesign Clear Snack Station Bins

Interdesign Condiment Storage Container 

MDesign Divided Packet Container

MDesign Square Bins 

MDesign Tea Bag Storage Container 

Photos by the one and only Lizzyography

Special thanks to the Container Store for helping fill up our space and Tracy Bowers for her time and hard work!!