That should have been done by you and the Kitchen Designer during the design phase. It’s a little late to start now.

Put the day to day dishes near dishwasher. Pots and pans are bulky so what storage did u create for them . Then generally deal w spices / oils in your cooking routine: away from heat and light is best. ...but you want them handy. Serving ware /platters /locations based on use ....frequency. Pantry items in pantry or cabinets w organization wire inserts that you buy. Remote spots for holiday or other lesser used items.

GD, it probably won't be optimal at this point, but still has to be done.

Tonya, you want to put things away close to where they will be used the most. Near the stove you want potholders, cooking utensils, cooking oils and spices, pots and pans.

In the prep area (ideally between sink and stove) you want knives, colanders, cutting boards, and trash/compost.

Put dishes near the dishwasher, so clean dishes are easy to put away.

Don't put things back in the general location they were in the old kitchen, just out of habit. Carefully consider how often you use an item, so that things used all the time are convenient, and that big soup kettle you use a few times a year is out of the way (like above the fridge). I like to think in terms of "prime real estate" - the busiest items in your kitchen get the best locations.

Hopefully your new kitchen is loaded with drawers. If you haven't had a lot of drawers before, you are in for a treat! Drawers are a fine place to put plates and glasses; small appliances; deeper drawers can be used for vertical storage of cake pans, pie plates, etc, if you use spring-loaded dividers to hold things upright.

If your uppers go to the ceiling, if it's not too late, get extra shelves for all the uppers. That way you can store more things without stacking, by placing items the same height on the same shelf (for example, in my kitchen, I have water glasses on one shelf, coffee mugs on another).

Congratulations on your new kitchen, and I hope it makes you happy every day!

The strategy I used was to draw my cabinets on paper and label where I wanted things to go by category; pots and pans, dishes, bakeware, spices, etc. It helped me get a visual and move things around on paper first. Then I used blue painter's tape and labeled each cabinet and drawer with what I wanted the contents to be so that it made it easy to unpack and load everything.

Figure out how you cook a meal and where you want things to be Yes, it should have been done BEFORE you re-did the kitchen, but better late than never.

Kitchen organization is very much like organizing ones handbag or wallet; it's very personal. Where I would prefer something, someone else might not. For instance, my dishes are halfway across the kitchen. It was far more important to me to have that huge bay window that walk a few steps to the cabinets that held my dishes. I have no regrets. I had a custom-depth cabinet put on the wall at right angle to this huge window and it holds all my glassware. It's far more difficult to walk across the kitchen with multiple glasses in hand, than a stack or plates or bowls.