I don't have a small kitchen, but I don't have a dish washer, and I don't have much room around the sink for the other dish racks. This one fits just perfectly.
I don't collapse it, it stays up all the time. And it's been really sturdy.
If you're curious like I was, the dimensions given are for the top part after it's expanded. But the thing is coned shaped. The base is what I wanted to know, because that's where the tight space is.
The base is 11" wide x 15" long with a 1" lip for the drip.
I'd give this 5 stars except it sucks for glasses. It really sucks for holding glasses. The thing is made to hold 15 plates at a time in a small apartment. What?! Look at the product image, it's holding 4 plates and a tea cup that's sideways? Who does that? Not me. I have tall glasses that awkwardly fit in this thing.
Note to the designers of this thing... Do one half of the unit as it is, but the other half, give me some prongs sticking up to hold the glasses instead of those long ribs used to hold plates.
I think I might get adventurous today, pull out the Dremel and do some surgery to make this a useable product.
Overall, I've had it for a month or so now, and I'm happy with it. And I was torn between 3 and 4 stars. But because it can't hold glasses, I'm a bit disappointed.