Once again, on my quest to fill my kitchen with any and every natural wood household accessory that I could find, I immediately bought the first natural wood paper towel holder that I came across, the Kamenstein Wooden Paper Towel Bar.

However, unlike most my other natural wood kitchen accessories, this one didn't stay part of my "kitchen family" for very long. It looked nice (at least at first) but that was about the only thing that it had going for itself.

We're not building a Piano here!
Everything screws together with this paper towel holder. The bar that holds the paper towels screws into the base, the top piece that holds the paper towels on screws onto the bar and the tiny pole that is supposed to be there for.... (well, what on earth is that there for anyway, looks?) screws into the base as well. WAY too much screwing if you ask me!

Each time you need to change out your paper towel roll you have to go though a major ordeal just to get it apart and back together. To me that is just too much work for something as simple as a paper towel holder.

How can something so simple cause so many problems?
This paper towel holder and I just didn't see eye to eye. Although taking it apart and putting it back together was inconvenient to say the least, I probably could have gotten over my frustration with that if only it didn't start falling apart.

Just like all things that get screwed a lot, eventually it becomes loose. (No pun intended!) After changing out my paper towels several times I began to notice that the actual paper towel bar was becoming loose. Then it wasn't too much longer that the side pole was doing the same. It got to the point that every time you went to place a new roll of paper towels on it you had to the musical tighten game to get all the pieces tightened. You would tighten the top, which in turn would loosen the bar. Then you would tighten the bar, which caused the paper towels to push against the side pole and unloosen it... etc, etc. It was a never ending cycle. It became a very "touchy" little booger. The screws were stripped and the pieces wouldn't stay tightened for any length of time.

The side poll... what is this for again?
I had to go re-read the other review on this paper towel holder to try to figure out what on earth this poll was for because for me, it was nothing more than a nuisance. I discovered that it's to actually hold the paper towels in place. But I found that to only hold true if you were to only use the "regular" size paper towels. If you are like me and like to buy the BIG roll of paper towels then forget it, the roll won't fit right. I mean sure, if you try hard enough you will just barely be able to squeeze a big roll on there but that is not without consequence. It will be squished in there so tightly that you won't be able to unroll it to get a paper towel out. So, because of this I find this side poll rather pointless. It can look as good as it wants sitting up there on my kitchen counter, but it you are unable to get a paper towel off it, then what good is it?

In the end, there it sat, just barely doing it's kitchen duty. I can safely say that I got "screwed" with this one!

I found one that works much better
After "fighting" with this paper towel bar for way longer than I should have, I decided to let someone else fuss with it... I sent it off to the thrift store. Lots of luck to whoever ends up with this winner.

Shortly after, I found another natural wood paper towel holder at Sears. It had the same great concept, but a much better design. The paper towel pole and the base are one unit (no screwing), the top piece slides over the pole and just sits on top of the paper towels (no screwing) and best of all, there is no side pole. It works perfectly. Now I can have the natural wood looking towel holder that I wanted that looks great, is sturdy and is convenient to use. This one still sits proudly (after 2 years) on my kitchen counter.

If you are willing to do all the screwing (and unscrewing) and to only use the regular size paper towels, then you will probably have a much better experience than I did. However, with better designs available, I would suggest to skip over this one to avoid the many hassles that I experienced.



Recommended: No