Easy Reach Upper Cabinet

11 years ago

Hello, just stumbled on a 2 door easy reach cabinet. To date, only saw the typical double piano hinged door. Anyone have these? Assuming you need open/close in a specific order. Was thinking this may avoid sagging doors and doors banging into neighboring doors? Pros/Cons?

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Comments (7)

kirstyeg
11 years ago
My parents have them in their 1990 kitchen. It may be different now- but I recall the downside is that its a two-step, two hands effort to open it, which is annoying when you're already holding something. Also the doors only go back one way (e.g. right door then left door) and if you do it the wrong way the door whacks into the hardware.
AnnKH
11 years ago
I am not a fan of piano-hinge doors in general, but I have them on two easy-reach cabinets. It took a little tiny bit of gutting used to, to learn to open them without banging the adjacent cabinets, and close them with the hinge in the corner (DH still leaves it ajar now and again). Of course there's no way to put soft-close hinges on an easy-reach.

I think the advantages of a single door outweigh the disadvantages.
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Matthew Rieger
Original Author
11 years ago
Does one door not have a handle ? All photos always show both doors opened.
beenzmail
11 years ago
We were hoping to do ours like this one. Yes, only one side has a handle. Here they have an indent to help open the other side. I like it better than the piano hinge. We will just put the things that are used less behind the second door.
hazelwags
11 years ago
We had one installed recently so the jury is still out. My initial thought is that I will only use the cabinet for less frequently used items. We selected this style cabinet so we could see everything and not have a blind area like in our old kitchen. I think holiday items and vases will ultimately reside there. And yes, only one door has a knob. The door with the knob is slow close. The other one is not.
texasgal47
11 years ago
I have a piano hinge base cabinet and am not a fan of them. Company invariably knocks the door into the adjacent cabinet, causing a scar on the finish. Handling it gently is a learned technique. Due to my dislike of piano hinges and overlap doors, I opted for a diagonal corner cabinet for the upper and lower in the other corner, with a Super Susan in both. These are a joy to operate and yield tons of storage. No regrets going against GW advice in my small kitchen. For me, this is one case of function over form.
beenzmail
11 years ago
Hazel, why is it worse to use than a standard cabinet? We were hoping to keep our glasses and mugs there so it will be used daily. We could do the blind corner, or keep the slanted that I have now. It holds a lot, but makes the kitchen look unbalanced. I don't want the piano hinge.