Kitchen wall unit height - up to the ceiling or leave a gap?

[Sorbustree123]

What are your thoughts on this? Pros/cons welcome. Thanks!

Gap for ventilation

We have a small gap between top of cupboards and ceiling. It’s enough to get on small steps to give the tops the odd wipe over but not wide enough for the cats to get up there and no temptation to store anything on top of the cupboards.

We have about an inch gap I can get the duster along, def up to the ceiling

My DM has hers right up to the ceiling. She likes it and there is no temptation for her to climb up to dust it. I have a space and have never been tempted to climb up to clean it!

Up to the ceiling or you have to clean the tops, which get greasy and dusty. Never thought about ventilation, but if you think that's an issue then leave a small gap and put in a strip matching the units/doors to cover the gap - won't be completely air tight.

A gap up top can make the room feel larger - or perhaps more the other way, cupboards up to the ceiling makes it smaller.

That does depend on the size and shape of the room, colour of the units etc.

Can you use the tops of the cupboards for anything, even just lighting?

Our old kitchen had a gap of about 6 inches. It was full of sticky dust on the top (despite using an extractor fan... I shall blame the previous owners!) and find difficult to reach to paint the wall behind it.

Ours now go all the way to the top which is great, looks really smart (even though I do need a kids stool from IKEA to reach the top shelf!)

It depends how tall your ceilings are. You don't want too big a gap under them/for them to be too high to reach.

You can put newspaper on the top of the cupboards and just replace when they get full of dusty grease. Makes an interesting read when you take them down.

I don't understand why anyone would like a gap.....it gets so dusty and it's a pain to be climbing up to clean up there....

I would go to the ceiling with a shadow gap.

Depends how high the ceiling is surely.....

I seriously regret having a gap of about half a meter. The tops get absolutely filthy with grease and dust. I wish ours went all the way to the top, although it would mean having to use a step to reach the top shelf.

I’ve got a gap, I don’t like the look of cupboards to the top. I’ve put paper on the tops and then can just throw it away when the dust/grease settles.
Go with what you like the look of. Or what your storage needs are.

A shadow gap is normally only 1cm max. It looks nice with a led strip and is not big enough to gather dirt/dust. If you go all the way to the ceiling it can look naff unless everything is perfectly flat. It might work better in a more traditional kitchen where you can cover the top with a trim.

Gap:
potential for Christmas lights (get electrician to put a socket up there)
Can add ambient lighting strip
Display potential
Can look better proportioned
Gets filthy which may or may not bother you
Don’t put newspaper there or it will advertise how many years since you cleaned it!

No gap
No nasty greasy dust
Storage space for stuff you rarely use
Can look more streamlined
Things will get lost in the back of the top presses
Can have glass/frosted doors on top and ambient light
No one can put crap up on top

Either cupboards to the top, or cupboards part way up with a stud wall built on top to fill the gap. Definitely don’t leave the gap open.

We've got high ceilings and have a bank of floor to ceiling cupboards which we love. There's no gap at the top as we had shorter units put up there to fill it. We store things that are rarely used in those units and it's so much better than having things stored on top of the units and needing to be cleaned before use. In a previous kitchen, we had wall units hung so they were high enough to reach the ceiling - it meant there was more space for my tall DH to use the worktops.

Up to the top , gives additionally space for all the kitchen junk you only use once in a blue moon. Plus less cleaning!

So helpful, thank you all. I love the newspaper suggestion @AndIquote @CrystalMaisie plus @thelegohooverer for pointing out this does put a date stamp on cleaning! I think we'll probably go almost to the top with the wall unit to make the most of the additional storage. Thanks again!

We wouldn't be able to reach the top shelf of our cupboards if they went to the top (we're 5'11" and 6'1" respectively). We use the top as additional storage for things like the preserving pan and medication we don't want the kids to get their hands on, plus recipe books.

@AndIquote

You can put newspaper on the top of the cupboards and just replace when they get full of dusty grease. Makes an interesting read when you take them down.

Thank you - what a great tip! Mine are so dirty I was embarrassed to see even my daughter looking up there for something the other day! My tip in return is to wrap anything I store up there in cling film - so when you need to use it you can just remove the cling film and its clean (I have a lot of Christmas crockery up there which only gets used once or twice a year.)