If you are looking for some space-saving and organization tricks for your kitchen, you might find yourself limited by the amount of cabinetry you have available. Create even more storage with the help of a hanging rod with hooks and baskets. Keeping your countertops clean and clutter-free is easy to do with a system like this. The entire project was purchased at IKEA and is part of the Fintorp series. To keep yourself organized, assign each basket a specific purpose. My baskets contain household items, such as sugar, coffee, oil for cooking, salt, pepper, etc. The caddies hold chargers and respective cell phones while charging overnight. If an item does not fit in the baskets or caddies, it is not allowed on the counter.
I purchased four of the rails in black as well as four wire baskets and two caddies. After laying it all out on the counter, the entire rail system measured 7.5 feet. Each rail can lock into the next rail, so you can create the look of one seamless wall organizer.
First, be sure to find the studs in your wall. Don’t worry too much about spacing the hardware, even though they are beautiful pieces on their own. Once all the baskets are up, the focus is what is in them and not on the mounting hardware. It is much more important to have the hardware screwed into the studs.
After everything was secured and hooked on, I added the various baskets and caddies. One basket holds cooking supplies and is situated right next to the stove. The next basket holds containers with sugar and coffee. Next to the sugar and coffee basket is a caddy. They are meant for utensils, but I purchased two of them and placed them right in front of the outlets in order to hide them. Each caddy contains cell phones and chargers. When a phone needs to charge, you can just slide the caddy over and plug it in. It is a great system to ensure chargers never get lost. The second-to-last basket holds tea bags and a decorative accessory to add some color! The final basket was a last-minute discovery. Each basket comes with a tray on the bottom — a very heavy, removable tray. I took the tray out of the last basket and turned it into a drying rack — now there’s no damp towel on the countertop and no huge drying rack taking up room either.
The baskets and hooks slide back and forth on the rail. I purchased extra hooks in case I ever want to hang something like scissors, kitchen utensils or even a dishtowel. It is easy to rearrange your setup.
Other items like a coffee pot and toaster oven are on another section of counter, so this section always stays neat and organized. Lifting these items up and off the countertop does not mean there’s more space to fill with other items. I’ve found that this system helps my kitchen stay more organized and frees up more counter space to cook and bake.