Only slightly over 3 years since I last shared inspiration for a pantry update, and here we are again! As much as we loved the way our farmhouse pantry remodel turned out 3 years ago, we are doing it all again to get much more functional storage. Not to mention, our style has evolved a bit as well—and, this time, we’re going with a painted pantry!
The room that is our current pantry is deep and narrow. While we worked hard to make it work well for us, as we were making so many massive changes around the house, a realization hit us: we can do better!
It is so interesting the way your mindset changes over time and as you take on larger and larger projects. When we first moved in, we didn’t have the vision to move our pantry. But, once we got to work doing a lot of renovating, we realized our mudroom area would serve us much better as a pantry. It is a wider and not as deep space, essentially the size of a normal closet.
When we moved in, it had mudroom cubbies built in:
(And, if you’re wondering what’s happening to the existing pantry, we’re going to hang some coats and boots in the back, and also get some vacuum and broom storage out of it. So, it will still be functional storage.)
First up, we purchased double doors to close off the closet space, and Dustin installed them last weekend. That means we’re getting ready to dive into designing our pantry layout, and looking at a lot of measurements very carefully for various baskets and bins.
This time around, I’m more inspired by some of the beautiful (and colorful!) painted pantry inspiration I’ve been seeing around the internet lately. I just love the calmness of a space where everything is painted out the same color, especially in a room where there is often a lot of visual clutter. It feels fresh and exciting right now.
We loved our white pantry, but we’re definitely going green this time!
Green Pantry Inspiration
Melanie Turner’s book is one of my favorite design books I own, and this shot from it lives rent-free in my mind forever. It’s my ultimate inspiration for our pantry, as well as our back room and eventual breakfast nook:
I already pulled some tile flooring inspiration from this image, and I love the green color she used on the cabinets, so that’s my ultimate inspiration for the pantry color. But, while she used tile on the walls, glass shelves, and frankly, has a window in it (ours is a closet, remember), I am loving some of the single-color painted pantries I’ve been seeing.
The one that stopped me in my tracks? This bad boy:
WOW! This one honestly floored me when I saw it in the pages of House Beautiful. First, I love the spice racks on the doors—it just seems like a smart storage option! And, of course, everything being one color helps a lot with quieting any visual clutter. I also really love the paneling on the back wall.
It also is so well-lit, which is a great reminder to install some lights in our pantry!
As we continue looking at green painted pantries, here is another great one:
Again, the trend seems to be to painting everything out in one color. The curtain on the bottom feels a little traditional for our style, but I have to say it really helps cut down on visual clutter so it seems like a great idea!
I mean, this is another whole room of a pantry, and, again, I’m working with a closet. But I had to throw it in there because the color is so great, the wallpaper (in a pantry!) is fun, and the shine on the cabinets is beautiful. Am I building the case for green yet?
Pantry Color Ideas and Inspiration
Well, now we’re diving into a few other colors! While green in the kitchen certainly has had a moment of collective consciousness, some designers are doing colorful painted pantries in other shades. For instance…mustard yellow??
This is very much the visual layout we’re looking at doing, with shelves above a small counter, but all done in a beautiful yellow that really contrasts with that wood door. So genius.
And here we have a pop of navy peeking out into a white kitchen. This is such a great view from a white kitchen isn’t it? That deep blue offers contrast and color and really draws you in. Plus, I like the contrast of the butcher block countertop—I think that’s our plan, too.
This is another great painted pantry, all painted the same color, but the contrast with all of the woven baskets really makes it pop, huh? This is a very simple build, actually, but still has such an impact!
Pantry Elements We’re Incorporating
Finally, I wanted to share a couple of inspiration images with specific elements we’re planning to incorporate. And I can’t possibly post about painted pantries without taking a peek at Emily Henderson’s deep, dark farmhouse pantry.
If you weren’t convinced about single-shade painted pantries before, I bet you are now. Her pantry really turned out so great (and she also has a little coffee and tea station in here). I also was SO skeptical about those wood shelf brackets when she first shared them, but seeing them all painted out the same color convinced me. In fact, we’re going to incorporate that element—the wood brackets—in our own pantry.
Another one with wallpaper! This is a DIY pantry rendered in blue, and I love that she also painted out her crates at the bottom in the same color to really drive the painted pantry energy home. It feels so fresh!
But the element of this pantry that I want to steal is the utility bar across the back. I really like that utility bar to hold mugs and scissors and other items. It’s useful but pretty! Plus, I think I’m actually going to hide my coffee maker in the pantry (we have an outlet), so it would be a natural extension to have my mugs hanging right there.
And finally, not a pantry at all, but a mudroom! If you look closely at the photo of our new pantry space back when it was a mudroom (with the cubbies), you’ll see that it’s full height. There’s actually a shelf above the closet (which is normal height). This little gif on Instagram gave me such a lightbulb moment—we can put little doors up top and make use of this shelf space as well!
This is why inspiration images are so valuable!
Planning for our Green Painted Pantry
What do you think of all these colorful, painted pantries? I would love to know if they’ve also been stalking you across the internet, or if it’s just me. Frankly, I’ve had pantries on the brain for a while so it might be just me.
I am so excited with the progress we’ve already made in our reimagined pantry, and I hope to share more of our plans and even the final reveal very soon!
PS: Love pantries? Check out our blog posts:
- Pantry Inspiration
- A Quick Pantry Progress Update
- These Canisters will Spark Pantry Joy
- Our Farmhouse Pantry Reveal
- Organizing Our House After Watching Get Organized on Netflix (Pantry + Fridge)
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