Thank you for the advice, everyone! We ended up buying the china protectors and have the china neatly stored in the lower cupboard. And like a pp related, we used unique storage for everything else. Her bath and bed linens as well as sweaters are neatly stored away in a pie safe sitting in the LR under the TV that is mounted to the wall. Such is the life of small apartments. But she really, really wanted her china and crystal. She adores her grandma and is so proud to the the first of all the cousins to have her own place. She was ecstatic when she got home from work and saw her treasures put away but where she can still access them easily!

Can she leave the crystal and china with her parents until she's got more space? If she doesn't see herself using it often and she needs the space, that's what I'd do. I only use mine for holidays, so I would not have wanted it taking up space in any of my smaller apartments.

Heat won't bother them. Bone china does better with heat than ceramic actually. It's why it was invented (boiling tea cracks ceramic, so bone china from China became popular).

FWIW I stored my crystal in my TV cabinet in my first place. It had glass doors and didn't look half bad there. I also stored my china in a secretary that I had in the family room in the upper part.

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, I think one reason builders went nuts over the open floor plan is they didn't have to purchase and install kitchen cabinets and it saved them lots of money! Presume you're storing the pots and pans using the Manhattan Method (in the oven). In any event, I store some of my dry goods (flour, beans, rice, etc) in a lower cabinet right next to my oven and I've never noticed any problem. I did worry about it before hand, though.

The only thing I will NEVER do, is store any kind of food in the lower cupboards. Rats, mice, other critters and vermin - first entry point.

Ha ha, yep, love that term, the Manhattan Method. That's what we're doing! And, also thanks to the pp for the suggestion re the china protectors -- it sounds like a good idea either way. So then with a quorum of two, we're going to go for it!

I don't think the heat will bother it much but there will probably be a build up residue of grease.

She can order something like this online:
http://www.bedbathandbeyond.com/store/category/storage-cleaning/kitchen-bath-storage/china-protectors/12216/

Yeah, I think one reason builders went nuts over the open floor plan is they didn't have to purchase and install kitchen cabinets and it saved them lots of money! Presume you're storing the pots and pans using the Manhattan Method (in the oven). In any event, I store some of my dry goods (flour, beans, rice, etc) in a lower cabinet right next to my oven and I've never noticed any problem. I did worry about it before hand, though.

A friend and I are helping her daughter set up her first post-college apartment. We're having a lot of fun doing it (!) but we're not sure about one thing. In addition to the items she will use on a day-to-day basis, the daughter has a set of crystal and bone china that she absolutely cherishes that was given to her by her grandmother.

The apartment is a modern open layout without any reasonable space for a china cabinet to store the china or crystal. In the kitchen there is one under-counter cabinet and two upper-level cabinets. We put her day-to-day items in one of the upper level cabinets right next to the stove/sink, and we put her crystal in the upper-level cabinet that is further away and hard to reach. But that leaves the china.

The only logical place for the china is the under-counter cabinet immediately adjacent to the oven. We are hesitating to do this because we're worried (hopefully, needless worry) about heat from the oven damaging the china. FWIW the daughter does cook and bake. Not every day but she envisions using the oven at least once or twice a week. Any input?

There is absolutely no storage in this apartment. We even thought about bins in the coat closet but even that is teeny tiny and doesn't have much space even on the floor!

Thanks in advance for any and all advice!