When my DIL redid the kitchen I took all of the old cabinets. We mounted the top ones on the wall for my fabric. Since there were fewer bottom cabinets, we spaced them under the top one, one on each eand and one in the middle - leaving room between them so that I would have space to "hide" things that I needed but didn't want to show.
Then we put fiberboard on top of the bottom cabinets and little curtains in front of the two blank spaces. So I have a 12' by 2'counter top where I can cut, iron and sew. It's down in the basement so it's also handy for folding laundry.