My cousin is going to build for me a storage cabinet. Which has me wondering what features to include. He is going to make it portable and as big as I want. Just thought I would get your thoughts

Ideal is tricky, because in part I don't know what kind of size you're thinking of.

But since you're asking, from a hobby (not business) standpoint, I'd start with:

~A place for tips to be arranged nicely and not thrown in a drawer.
~Individual slots for icing color, airbrush color, pearl dust, or other things that come in small jars.
~A place for cookie cutters and fondant cutters. I like to micromanage so probably several different compartments so I can sort by shape or holiday or other themes.
~Several shelves for pans, to be able to sort by size/shape.
~Lots of drawers for miscellaneous things. At least one drawer for spatulas. Again, I tend to cringe at the measly two drawers I have because it turns into a "junk drawer" mish mash. I like lots of little spaces to organize.
~Possibly a spot to store fondant buckets. I tend to get the Duff stuff when it's on sale/I have a good coupon. I have a cupboard shelf full of them now. This probably depends on how much you use fondant or if you make your own (I don't have a good mixer for it).
~If you have a stand mixer that you don't always keep on the counter, you might want a spot to store that and all of its parts.

Thanks, those are all great ideas. I do have a Kitchen aid mixer on my counter, and like you I only have one drawer for spatulas which I hate. My mind was going to the idea of lots of drawers, so your ideas for the other things is great!

I like deep drawers for measuring cups and mixer attachements, etc. The other thing I love is a place for all of my small appliances. And I like the knive drawers and other drawers to have dividers. Another perk is that the shelves slide out so I can reach what is in back. And I like a caddy on the door of the pots and pans cabinet where I put all the lids.

More deep drawers & slots for cake pans instead of regular shelves. If I had it to do all over again I'd borrow some of Earlene Moores custom kitchen cabinet ideas. I love her cabinet for nested pans, and the pull out drawers on wheels are a super idea too. You can view them on the link if you're interested.

http://www.earlenescakes.com/Kitcabnts.htm

I have several. Here is one. It was purchased at home depot. You will need larger one for bigger lids. The one shown is on my island. The shelves here are shallow so this one is not very big. The cabinets by my stove are deep so I have larger ones there.

Be sure you can close the door! This door closes all the way but it doesn't look like it would in the picture. The lid cage is not higher than the pans. The cabinet is a little deeper than it looks.

I have these great "pan racks" I got at walmart that allow me to store lids, cookie sheets and cooling racks up right instead of stacked. I LOVE these things.

http://www.organizeit-online.com/images/3854.jpg

But my FAVORITE thing is the scrapbooking cabinet I purchased at Hobby Lobby. I think this would be an awesome basis for your cousin to work from depending on what you need. I have room for 12 inch round pans and I nest my smaller pans in them. I store all of my cakes circles, tools, spatulas etc in this cabinet...Tons of drawers and I prefer mine not to be deep because that way I don't over fill them.

The only thing I would change is the shelves on the right side are really deep and things tend to fall to the back so I would prefer those were shallower. Here are the pics

Open - You can see there are 9 drawers in the top part. There are 2 large drawers, one narrow drawer and 3 (semi -useless drawers on the bottom part.
http://www.keeponcaking.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/cakedesk2.jpg

Closed
http://www.keeponcaking.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/cakedesk.jpg

I would love to have another one of these. I'm not sure if you can tell but the top part of the unit has removable shelves so that I can adjust the height. The only limitation is that each section is just over 12 inches so if I was going to have someone build me one, I would have them make the vertical separaters on the top removeable so I could make a wider section for larger pans. I can even put a couple of sheet pans (face down) on top.

I love that when I close it, my kitchen suddenly looks clean

Warchild, thanks for putting in the website that has Earlene moore's Cake kitchen. I really like everyone's ideas, but I do have one question.

If you had the opportunity, and I don't at this time, but if I did could I use a pan rack that suspends from the ceiling in the kitchen in a commercial or legal kitchen? I see them in kitchens on the food channel and I would imagine that they would have to have legal kitchens, but maybe not? I finally was able to get one for my own personal kitchen and I love it. It saves me so much storage room. the cabinet that I put my lids in is small and narrow so it works great. I use that little cabinet for my pitchers(for drinks and my blender. I kind of wish I had a shelf in there, but it would have to be not so deep that I couldn't store my blender also. These questions are for anyone that knows the answers. I realize that for every state and county that things are different, but surely there are some things that remain the same state to state and county to county? maybe? Thanks.

Thank you Ladies for all the pictures, it really helps. Oh how I wish I could have a space like Earlene Moore's Cake kitchen. I was thinking more on the lines for this cabinet to hold all the cutters for fondant, colors and all the thousand and one toys I just had to have. I'm going to have an island build for rolling fondant and holding my pans, spatulas and rolling pins. I will post pictures when the cabinet is build. Oh he is building me a bookcase for all my cook books so that will give me a whole upper cabinet free!