Curved corner cupboards - style over function?

[Jacky83]

I'm designing a new kitchen and I'll have an island for the first time. I love the look of the islands with curved cupboards on the corner but I'm just wondering how useful those cupboards are? Am I sacrificing storage for looks or are they useful cupboards?

Love to hear whether people put them in and regretted it or find them useful.

I can help with this one. We have several from DIY Kitchens and in order to be as deep as an ordinary square unit, you have to put a small square unit behind them (the curved ones are 300mm deep so fine as wall units but shallower than standard base units). The DIY curved units have one shelf in them - more would be useful. I haven't really had any issues with them because I have plenty of smallish stuff to go in them - one has tea, coffee, etc in it; another fits a revolving spice rack and so on. My frustration is more that there is only one fixed shelf. We have three sets of pan drawers though which give lots of storage space.

The curved units look great, but are expensive compared to the ones with straight doors. I assume it's shaping the doors which is the major cost.

I love the curved corners and you can store things in them, but it does add to the cost quite a lot though. if you are planning on living in your house for the next 20 years, like I am then the investment can be warranted :-)

I have them at both ends of my island but the curved areas are slightly different. The sink end has a straight cupboard between the curved ones that houses the sink. The other end is partially straight but has a circular table offset with curved cupboards underneath. Compared to the cost of the hob, oven and granite and wood circular table, the cost of the curved cupboards pales into insignificance!

We had the same dilemma op. In the end we opted for a kitchen style that allowed full sized normal corner cupboards, but with a piece of curved edging that gives a rounded corner. This is for all corners not just the island. Looks fab, plenty of space and cheaper too.

The function of curved cupboards, I think, is more about the space in your kitchen than what you store inside them.

We have a large wide 'peninsula' that separates the kitchen from the dining area. It houses the hob on one side and provides workspace on the other. You also have to walk past the end of it to get into the utility. There is a lot of traffic around it and it the space feels much more comfortable with rounded edges than it would if there were corners iyswim.

Inside the cupboards, there are 3 shelves which are pretty useful for small things like egg cups, ramekins, jugs, place name holders etc.

We had a small narrow kitchen so got curved ends to avoid bumping into sharp edges. Can store a fair amount in them i used it for small things like glasses and bottles
Will be going for curved in new place also

Curved corner units are gorgeous. do it. just do it.

Positioning - make sure design/fit puts a reasonable gap/filler between the opening edge and whatever is adjacent - our fitter didn't get the gap right and the opening edge nudges against the adjacent drawers - liveable with but mildly annoying

Size of doors can mean that the autoclose has to work hard - we have one that really needs 3 autoclose hinges rather than 2

Finally - on the hinge side - when the curved door is open the cupboard on that side is inaccessible - we put dishwasher on that side and can't pull stuff directly out of dishwasher into corner cupboard

Minor niggles but learning points for next time