Open Shelves

Lately there has been a lot of talk about open kitchen shelves in blogland and I have very mixed feelings about them. I do like their look, but you'd have to have very cohesive dishes to make them work and what about dust? While going through my image files I came across this one though which worries me indeed.This is undeniably a beautiful kitchen. But a few things worry me. Shelves in front of windows? Whats going on there? Like -take your dusty shelves and put them in the BRIGHT light. Also, I don't like blocking windows in general like this -you can't enjoy the beautiful view!

Also, this is obviously a renovation of an older house -but do you really need to block the windows with the cabinets? You can see that the windows go BELOW counter height - YIKES. Thats just a formula to get dust and crumbs stuck down there - plus looking at the house from the exterior -those windows will look WHACK. What do you think? I love the look of all the white dishes though, those huge windows (A shame they block them with counters, dishes and shelves) and the TALL ceilings!