Can't they be both?? I'd like to think mine is - a china cabinet (actually a glass fronted bookcase) that only holds the fancier, not-for-everyday stemware and serving pieces and a collection of smaller vases.

I dislike open shelving or glass-fronted cabinets because I need every inch of storage for storage, not for a pretty display. That said, I have glass-fronted uppers in my kitchen, one of which is visible when you are walking into the living room or dining room. I used it to store my crystal so it looks pretty, but it is completely full...no staging. The other cabinet is not visible so it contains glasses and mugs, again not staged, although I do keep it organized.

I have the same approach with bookshelves. Mine are chock full of books, no room for display items.

Well....it's staged for a photo...that's not "real". So I guess I don't understand the question.

Do you go "pretty" or "practical"?

Pretty: I have friends whose glass fronted china cabinet holds a china plate leaned against the back, a cup and saucer in front and then a piece of crystal stemware next to the cup -- two shelves with 3 each means that they are displaying 6 plates, 6 cups and saucers and 6 pieces of stemware.

Practical: if you stack plates, bowls, saucers, dessert plates, cups and crystal on those shelves, you could put a full service for 12 of all of those items in the same space.

Not that practical isn't "pretty".

And yes, I'm sure bloggers and magazine photos have been staged and tweaked until it is just right and often the person whose photo of those open shelves or glass fronted cabinets doesn't really live like that.

Here is my china cabinet -- I call it practical:

And this is the pretty I was talking about which I found on line:

And, of course, with blogs and such, I can see someone taking all of their dishes out of their china cabinet, "staging" it for a photo for their blog and then putting them back in!

My butler's pantry has glass doors and glass shelves. We designed it to store AND display my 36 piece set of Waterford stemware. It is lit from within & looks so pretty. However, the main purpose of putting the stemware there was functionality. I used to store all of it carefully wrapped in boxes, and bc it was such a pain, I hardly ever used it, or even saw it. Now I see the crystal everytime I walk past the butler's pantry, and it makes me happy.

I always aim for both. My glass front kitchen cabinets hold a lot of dishes. I don't stack things that are not the same (i.e., no sugar bowl on the salad plates). I don't do this for practical reasons - don't want to move one thing to get to another. I have to do this in the huge corner cabinet (no glass!) in the breakfast room as I have so many danged dishes. Yes, it IS an addiction...

My dining room china cabinet is open and closed, emptied and filled regularly throughout the day. We eat every dinner off the old China and and use the crystal glasses for water. I use to try and keep it perfectly neat and organized but it was a losing battle now it functions well but is jammed packed with things in the wrong spots so not pretty.

In my future glass fronted kitchen cabinets, I will display my everyday dishes and glassware, nicely stacked, no differently than if the dishes were behind regular doors. All my dishes and glasses and such match or coordinate and I am pretty neat, so no problems there. And I really like to look at dishes, so pretty and practical.

My two china cabinets in the dining room hold crystal and hollowware instead of my endless stacks of dishes. Sadly, I have no butler's pantry.

I like wood front cabinets because I like to fill them up. I'd rather not have people see what's behind! I have open shelving in my office, and not only did it take me ten years to figure out what to do with them and how to make them look nice, I also ended up using them for storage and light weight items only because the shelves warp down if I put heavy stuff in them. Nope - open shelving is not for me!

i'm with the others, and so nice to see that. Pretty must be practical also, or I'll end up not liking it. Actually, I'm too old and experienced to even begin liking what I know won't work well and/or is a waste of important space, such as needed storage styled strictly for appearance. I know I'll find Fun2BHere's display tremendously more pleasing than some real estate stager's, and the same for the others. (My bookcases are also full of books. :) )

Otoh, imo the old function versus style argument (normally entered into to glorify function alone) has probably misguided many millions and lead to very disappointing design. Pleasing appearance IS a very important function, but what that is of course varies tremendously.

hamamelis -- my bookcases are too -- there's just something about shelves and books without "clutter"!

Martha and Shee, whatever yours is, is what I like.