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Wall-mounted dish drying racks have suddenly become the new must-have item for family kitchens

Five reasons why America is falling in love with this old-school kitchen essential.

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Maiju Gebhard with her dish-drying racks

Just like hemlines for jeans and living room paint colors, trends come and go like the wind. But sometimes, even trends steeped in pure logic that genuinely make life easier take a while to gain traction all around the world. Such is the case for the wall-mounted dish drying racks, which are finally becoming a staple in kitchens in the globe's last outlier—America.

While there had been earlier patents, it wasn't until the 1940s when Finnish inventor Maiju Gebhard popularized the idea of the wall-mounted dish drying rack, known in Finland as astiankuivauskaappi. The idea is simple: instead of a drying rack in your sink or on the kitchen counter, this one is mounted directly above the sink in a closed or open cabinet with an open-ended bottom, allowing water to drip, and plates, etc. to properly air dry.

In an article about Nordic inventions for 99 Percent Invisible (99pi), writer Kurt Kohlstedt notes that Gebhard's design, "in conjunction with the Finnish Association for Work Efficiency, was a huge success. Her basic design is widely used in Finnish kitchens to this day. Over time, older versions built with wood have been replaced by ones using metal wire and/or plastic."

In David Cad's TikTok video, he illustrates what it might be like for a "foreigner to see astiankuivauskaappi" for the first time. "Who else knows about this?" he jokes. His counterpart answers, "What? This is in like every Finnish home."

@davecad

Tbh it's pretty awesome 😂 #suomitok #suomi #suomitiktok #fyp #ttsuomi #livinginfinland #finland #finnish #fypsuomi #astiankuivauskaappi

The video has garnered nearly half a million likes and has comments from all over the world.

An American writes, "I live in a New York City apartment and I would kill to have that much cabinet storage space."

One TikToker notes, "Come to Singapore. You'll find this in almost every home."

Many living in Europe also vouch for them. From Italy to Romania to Spain, people chime in to share that this has been the standard for quite some time. A person in Poland claims, "Very popular in Poland, with a tray under the cabinet to avoid drops on the counter."

In the Middle East, someone asks, "Is this a thing? It's a basic here in the Middle East." To that point, another adds, "It's in Saudi Arabia and we improved it by making it slide down so you can stack on the upper shelf and then slide it back up."

-dish-drying racks, kitchen, organization, inventions www.youtube.com, Letters from the Freezer

It has taken a while for the West to catch up on this invention, but it's finally happening and better late than never. It makes so much sense and here are a few reasons why:

More hygienic

On traditional counter or sink-based drying racks, moisture can get trapped, leading to unsanitary conditions. And you know who loves those? Bugs and bacteria. When the rack is raised up, the airflow is better, which results in a cleaner dish and all-around more hygienic kitchen.

Dries dishes faster

With more efficient airflow comes faster-drying dishes. It's just science.

Saves energy and money

If you're using a dishwasher to wash and dry your dishes, you're using (on average) about 1800 watts of energy per cycle. This isn't outrageous, but one can still save money and precious energy by skipping the appliance and washing and drying the old-fashioned way.

Looks clean and cool

Stacked plates and glasses on the countertop can make kitchens seem messy. This mounted drying system eases up the visual clutter and gives at least some illusion of organization.

Frees up space

When your kitchen countertop is littered with an old-fashioned drying rack, then it takes up much-need space for cutting limes or whisking up cake batter. Opening it up will make a lot of difference, both for your visual aesthetics and practical purposes.


If you're ready to take the leap and are looking for options, Wayfair has dishrack drainer shelves, that are sleek and useful.

Also, the Asieit over-the-sink dish drying rack seems popular and affordable. It's an alternative to actually mounting the rack, as it's placed over the sink with extra storage on top.

To take it a step further, a mounted utensil rack adds a bit of pizzazz to the kitchen and again, gives much needed extra space. While it's not a drying mechanism, per se, it could be used as one if a tray is placed underneath.


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Woman makes a show out of timing how long it actually takes to do tasks she puts off doing

She's being hailed the "more relatable, Marie Kondo" for how she inspires people to tackle their own put off tasks.

@christinewrutzen/TikTok

Not all heroes wear capes.

We can all be guilty of convincing ourselves that certain tasks will take wayyyyyyy longer than they actually do. Those mountainous piles of clothes that need to be folded (or is it washed? who can tell anymore), the fridge that desperately needs old condiments thrown out, removing whatever entity is behind that couch…

No matter what chore we’re procrastinating on, odds are we are making it way more herculean than it actually is. And now, thanks to one brave—and very entertaining—soul, we have definitive proof.

In her super-viral TikTok series titled “How Long Does It Actually Take,” fellow procrastinator Christi Newrutzen dons a pair of sunglasses, comfy clothes, and a newscaster-worthy microphone as she times herself doing dull tasks she’s put off…some upwards of a couple of years.

It’s really the perfect combo of charming deadpan delivery, relatability, and eye-opening discoveries that make these videos so impactful. In the clip below, Newrutzen puts away two loads of laundry, which she had been putting off for 11 days.

Armed with her laptop (because she always has to watch something while doing laundry) Newrutzen managed to do it all in just 28 minutes.

@christinewrutzen

I dont know if it looks like it but it was in fact 2 loads of laundry 😂 and I always have to be watching something while I put away laundry otherwise it's like a death sentence 🥲 #cleantok #laundry #homeimprovement #clothes #adhd #executivedysfunction #organization

In another video, Newrutzen finally schedules a dentist appointment. After three years of avoiding it, the whole thing only took nine minutes.

@christinewrutzen

i dont know why this took me soooooooo long to do, but MAN do I feel so much better now, please don't judge me, this was hard 🥲 #procrastination #dentist #appointment #cleantok #organization #adhd #executivedysfunction #homeimprovement

Newrutzen also handles bigger tasks, like organizing the garage. This did end up taking a little over an hour. But considering the shelves have apparently “never not looked like this,” it’s still safe to assume this was undeniably less taxing than she assumed it would be.

@christinewrutzen

This one took me out, I was really not feeling it by the end 😩 ill have to take out all that stuff to the dumpster later 😅 #cleantok #cleaning #organizing #garage #procrastination

Newrutzen’s longest task to date seems to be repainting a chest of drawers she bought discounted in hopes of refurbishing. It was a project she started two years ago, and hadn’t touched since. This technically took her 23 hours, including waiting for paint to dry and whatnot. But the actual time spent working on said project was an hour and four minutes.

@christinewrutzen

Feels so good to have this finished omg 😩😮‍💨 #procrastination #homerenovation #spraypaint #homeproject #checklist

If this is inspiring you to finally conquer your own ever ending to-do list, you’re not alone. So many people shared how Newrutzen’s videos gave them the gumption to tackle their chores. Lo and behold, they made the same discoveries she did!

“I timed how long it took me to match the freaking socks last night,” one viewer wrote. “Because of you, I found out it only takes me 15 minutes!! I swore it was an hour long deal.”

“I’ve been staring at a mess in my hallway for about a week now trying to get myself to clean it up and because of your video I did it this morning and it took a total of 42 seconds,” another shared. “42 seconds!!!!!!”

Others just chimed in to praise Newrutzen for her contribution.

“You are the new, more relatable, Marie Kondo,” one person gushed.

“You're gently and comically reminding us that the giant, foreboding thing in the corner that we've been dreading for months is not THAT bad if we just do it ✨ TYSM,” said another.

productivity, marie kondo, getting things done, to do list, chores, procrastination An assortment of stick notes on a car steering wheelImage via Canva

Newrutzen told Upworthy that the response to her series has equally inspired her to do more.

"It feels incredible to know my videos are having this kind of impact on people and also I am finally getting stuff done that I've needed to do for years," she said, adding that she continues surprising herself with how quickly she gets certain tasks done. Unloading the dishes, for example, took around 5 minutes. "Dishes are literally the bane of my existence but seeing it through that perspective has helped me a lot!"

Next time you find yourself putting off that thing (you know the one), remind yourself that it likely won’t take nearly as long as your brain tells you it will. Maybe even take a page from Newrutzen’s book and time yourself doing it to get that hard data. Because, even though perfection is impossible, having something so minuscule take over valuable brain space is just plain stressful…more stressful than actually doing the thing.

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Scottish woman can't understand what the Americans who rented her apartment left behind

"It's An American thing." Is it?

via Canva/Photos and Vallgall/Flickr

A woman is shocked when she moves into her new apartment.

There has been a lot of fun chatter online about how Americans are different from Europeans in many ways. The most often cited differences are that Americans are incredibly friendly (to everyone), love to carry massive bottles of water with them everywhere, and have very loud voices. There are also differences when it comes to their homes. Americans love having large refrigerators, stocking up on groceries, and buying in bulk. Europeans tend to favor regular trips to the store and have a small fridge.

Author Willow Heath of Scotland recently added another thing to the list in her viral TikTok. She explains the confusion she experienced when moving into an apartment where an American couple previously lived. “Question for all the Americans out there. I have just moved into a new place here in Scotland, and previously, this flat was lived in by an American couple,” Health said. “I showed my friend who now lives in L.A. a curious thing about this flat, and they said, ‘Oh yeah, yeah, it's an American thing.' And the thing I'm talking about is hooks.”

Heath then shared all of the hooks she found in the apartment that were not removed after the couple left.

@willowtalksbooks

Do Americans love hooks? #usa #uk

Heath also noted there was a lazy Susan in the refrigerator that she had never seen before. “I've never seen this before. It's actually really cool,” she said, playing with the rotating plastic tray… “It turns around so you can get at things that are at the back so you don't have to reach all the way to the back … my friend said this is also an American thing,” she added.

Some Americans returned fire at Heath by asking why people in the UK don’t have hooks throughout their homes. “Is everything on the floor in Scotland?” one asked. “That couple was so nice to leave all their hooks for you,” another added. One American stood strong on their hook use: “American living in England, their lack of home organizing is astounding to me.”

Another American referenced the current UK versus U.S. realization that Robbie Williams, the subject of the critically acclaimed movie “Better Man” about a rockstar chimp, is massively popular across the pond and virtually unknown in America. “Are British people spending so much time listening to Robbie Williams they don’t know what hooks are?” a commenter joked.



One commenter, most likely in the UK, blamed the excessive number of hooks on American consumer culture. “We don't buy random stuff, so no need to hang everything, Americans hoard everything,” they noted.

At the end of the video, Heath shared that she wasn’t putting Americans down; she just never realized how much they like hanging things from hooks. “I'm not saying they're not useful, and I spent time in the States. I lived in upstate New York for a few months,” Heath said. “I like the U.S., I like Americans, I'm not attacking you … I just think this is an interesting cultural difference, hooks everywhere.” The good news for Heath is that nobody took the hooks down, so she may learn why Americans love them so much. As for Robbie Williams, not so much.

This article originally appeared in February

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A former hoarder gives life-changing hacks on how to declutter your world

"I was literally drowning in clutter."

Photo by Samet Kurtkus on Unsplash

A hoarder's home.

Sometimes, it simply starts with one pile. Some receipts, pay stubs, and bills. Then another pile forms—a shirt you meant to hang up, some workout gear. The piles begin to multiply, and before you know it, they've erupted like tiny volcanoes spewing lava (and junk) around your home. If you don’t even know where to begin in terms of clean-up, you're not alone.

cleaning, clutter, piles, hoarding, hoarderCleaning Hoarding GIF by 60 Second DocsGiphy

Mai Zimmy, on the TikTok page Mom Life & Cleaning, knows this feeling all too well. With over 400,000 followers and 9.1 million likes, she's living proof that an inability to organize is more common than one might think. In one post, she confesses that she was once a hoarder while showing screenshots of her cluttered house in 2020. Her voiceover exclaims, "I was literally drowning in clutter" as the camera pans over a junk-filled bathtub she dubs the "trash tub."

Now, just a few years later, she has helpful tips on how to remedy the situation. She mentions, right off the bat, that she learned the fundamental methods from "Queen" Marie Kondo. Questions like "Does it spark joy? Have you used/worked with it in the last year? Remove duplicates" and more, made famous by Kondo, help her begin. This leads to the truthful realization, "You can't clean clutter."

The first step, she says, is to "Learn to let go." Per Kondo, she shows how to put things into categories and work through them one step at a time.

@maizimmy

Ok. Maybe I was 1% of the problem 😆😅 people ask me all the time how I got my house in order when it was SO FAR GONE. The decluttering and cleaning schedule was HUGE. But even more than that was how my life has changed and just gotten easier over time. The babies aren’t helpless babies forever. It gets easier there for sure one they are in grade school. Plus, the obvious elephant in the room 😅 being a divorced mom in MY situation is about 100 times easier than what I was going through as a “married single mom”. I by no means want to promote divorce, but I do want to promote healthy marriages. No marriage counselor would have ever said my marriage was healthy and that is abundantly clear with how stress free life feels after leaving. #momlife #motherhood #cleantok #cleaningmotivation #cleanwithme #declutter @Procter & Gamble @Clorox

Step two is to "Implement a cleaning schedule." The idea is for that decluttering becomes an actual habit, etched into your mind. She urges people to "find cleaning schedules that work for you." She writes over a cleaning video, "I personally aim to do a nightly reset of the kitchen and living room before bed because these are the most-used parts of my home." She adds, "Then I have my weekly 1.5-hour reset and the occasional 'panic clean' before people come over lol."

Zimmy tells us that the third step is the most important to remember: "Give yourself some grace." She confesses, "When my home was at its worst, I was a 'married single mom' of three kids, two and under." She further relays that she had a full-time job, only to come home "to the second shift of taking care of everything for everyone." She then, adorably, throws some clothes into drawers, writing she still believes in the #NoFoldMethod.

She stresses the idea that "sometimes we're just in the thick of it. Things won't be so crazy forever, and to make the effort to do what you can in the free moments you have." She jokes, "As kids grow and life sorts itself out, you'll realize you were never the problem. Everyone else was." (She then notes in her TikTok description, "Okay, maybe I was ONE percent of the problem.")

Many in the comments seemed to really connect to her use of the phrase "married single mom." Zimmy also writes, "I by no means want to promote divorce, but I do want to promote healthy marriages. No marriage counselor would have ever said my marriage was healthy, and that is abundantly clear with how stress-free life feels after leaving."

In Zimmy's vulnerability, she gets to the root of what was or wasn’t working for her without vilifying anyone. Decluttering is so much more than tidying up, and many therapists explain what it can do to lift depression and anxiety. In her piece "The Many Mental Benefits of Decluttering" for Psychology Today, Diane Roberts Stoler, Ed.D. writes, "Excessive clutter often leads to feelings of shame, hopelessness, and guilt. The feelings can spiral, making it difficult to find the motivation to address the clutter. If someone is already suffering from depression, a cluttered home can worsen that depression. It is often a cycle. The more depressed you get, the harder it is to clean and organize."

Big and small changes, with a game plan and grace for yourself, can help break the shame spiral and get your living space actually "livable" again.

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