I did quite a few out-of-the-box things in my custom build. But this one probably takes the cake. I did IKEA cabinets in multi million dollar home. Gasp!
The Recommended Path
When it came time to think about cabinets, I took my builder’s recommendation. He was a good guy and had worked with a custom cabinet-maker in town for decades. He really trusted them- they’d done a great job for his clients innumerable times over the years.
We sat down and talked about what I was looking for. They took a couple of weeks and sent in their drawings. My heart sank. Was this what people raved about? Not only did it not fulfill many of the functionalities I was looking for, it did not look good either.
Worse still, the quote was $125k for the whole house. More than twice our budget.
I’d known my builder for several years, so I asked him outright what was going on. Turns out, it was the cost (always is!).
We had $60k in our line item budget for cabinets. And they had tried their darnedest to stick to it.
I knew right away it wasn’t going to work. I just needed to find something that would.
The Alternative
Like all good suggestions, this one also came from social media. I read about someone, another doc actually, who had used IKEA cabinets in her house and it looked really good! I googled all I could find on it and got more and more excited.
This might actually work.
The idea was to use IKEA cabinets in the kitchen and elsewhere. IKEA cabinets and apparently come along way in terms of quality. And to dress them up, one could use semi custom doors and panels. Doing this meant one couldn’t see the IKEA cabinet boxes at all, all visible parts are semicustom.
And boy, can you customize them. My mind was blown with all the different looks, ranging from traditional to modern and everything in between, that one could achieve.
The best part is, I would be right on budget. More on this in a bit.
Bringing the team on board
First I spoke to my husband. I brought him up to speed with what was going on in the world and told him that I wanted to do this. He was in.
It was a risk. But for people who see death every day as part of work, cabinets don’t seem like that big a risk.
What’s the worst that could happen? It would look horrible. It would not last. It would wear poorly. The drawers would fall apart and take my Crate and Barrel plates with them.
Meh. We’d wait a couple of years, maybe five, and redo them. Yes, it would be a miserable few months living through the renovation, but at least no one’s life was at stake.
We approached our builder. He fought with me a little bit, and then let me win.
He pointed out that it was not made of wood, but if MDF, which in his words, was just a little better than cardboard. What he didn’t account for was the fact that it was wrapped in waterproof material, which made it really hardy and water resistant.
He was afraid of resale value in a home like this.
He was worried it would be a pain to install.
But, good man that he is, he agreed. Two down, one to go.
We brought it up with a designer. To say that she did not take it well would be an understatement. She threw a fit. When I still didn’t listen, she quit the job.
She could not be associated with the project that included IKEA cabinets, she said. You have a beautiful house, she said, and I feel sad for what you were doing with it.
Meh, at least no one’s life is at stake.
We were going to do it.
The Downsides
These are some of the downsides of going with IKEA cabinets, they told us. I’m not sure they’re really downsides!
#1. IKEA cabinets are made of MDF, not wood. This makes them not water resistant. Not that wood is very water resistant either.
As I mentioned before, they come factory-wrapped with a plastic coating that makes them more water resistant than wood cabinets, at least as long as the coating is intact.
#2. Good quality wood cabinets last forever. Well, I’m not sure I want my cabinets to last forever. Tastes and trends change. As long as they last over a decade, I’m good.
In fact, we often hear the stories where people are renovating a space 20 years after it was first built and the cabinets are in perfect condition. They just look dated. Many of times, folks are unable to change out the cabinets because it is so expensive to do so.
#3. It is unconventional. It sure is. Folks in bigger cities like New York and Los Angeles are beginning to do this more commonly, but it is certainly not the norm in my neck of the woods. And that’s OK with me. It brings down the cost of the house, which may work in our favor if we need to sell.
#4. Installation is a pain. This one is true, especially in a project this size. When they delivered the cabinets, the crates were piled high all over my entire great room. When the doors and panels came in, they took up all of the family room. And these are generous sized rooms.
My builder had no experience with IKEA cabinets but found a subcontractor who did. However, his crew was baffled at the volume. I had to step in. I practically lived a the construction site for a week, sorting out parts for each cabinet so the installers could put them together.
IKEA cabinets are meant to be DIY projects- so they are not hard. It would’ve been a breeze if the project were smaller. Just the sheer number of cabinet parts to match was the hard part.
In hindsight, I would order each room or a subset of rooms in separate orders and get them installed in batches.
Designing IKEA Cabinets
I want lots of storage all over the house, so that everything had a place to go. That meant lots of cabinets and closets.
I was not familiar enough with IKEA’s products to do it on my own. Especially with my own designer just having quit, I wasn’t feeling too confident.
That’s when I found Inspired Kitchen Design (IKD). This is a design firm based in Atlanta, Georgia, that only designs spaces using IKEA cabinets and closets. The pictures on their website were inspiring. It was possible to do so much!
A few other points that were refreshing were that
#1. Their prices were extremely reasonable and transparent- easy to find on their website. No obscure pricing system, as is common in the custom building industry.
#2. Also, my point of contact in the beginning, when I had roughly 3567 questions, was the founder and CEO, Mike Toth. He was really easy to talk to, patiently answered all my questions, and allayed my fears.
#3. They had a one to two week turnaround time to complete the design and they actually stuck to it! By this time, I knew better than to expect anything to run on time with the building process. This was a very pleasant surprise.
They assigned me a designer who worked with me through the rest of the process. I gave her my floor plans and a detailed outlay of my idea for all the spaces, and she got to work.
I was allowed two sets of changes. It was easy. Making all the changes on the first draft allowed me to get two or very close to my final vision. The second set of changes were really minimal.
Each plan came with 2D and 3D views. And all the cabinet parts that I would need to buy from Ikea, made into a shopping list.
They were also used to working with another badass company, SemiHandmade.
Custom doors and panels for IKEA cabinets
SemiHandmade makes semicustom doors and panels for IKEA cabinets. That’s all they do. And do they do it well! The inspiration pictures on their site are a dream.
In going through SemiHandmade, your IKEA cabinet boxes are completely hidden. The doors are in the front and any place where the cabinets do not die into a wall, you can put a panel.
They have an enormous array of selections, many of them clean, more modern lines, right up my alley. And in some beautiful colors too. In fact, I chickened out- I did 90% of the cabinets in white and went for a pop of color only in a couple of spaces.
Maybe when I’m feeling up to a change, that’s what I’ll do… change up the door colors.
Cabinet Hardware: The Jewelry
Since I did so well with the cabinets, I splurged on the hardware.
I wanted big modern drawer and cabinet pulls, so that’s what I did. And they cost a pretty penny. Though nothing in the bigger scheme of things.
I went with Emtek hardware from Build.com.
The Numbers
Okay, now to the meat of the matter. Money. Numbers are accurate but rounded out.
Inspired Kitchen Design for 12 distinct spaces: $2000
IKEA cabinets and all other parts: $16,000
Semihandmade custom doors and panels: $32,000
Emtek Hardware: $3500
Labor for Installation: $9000
Grand total: $62,500
$2,500 above budget.
I went all out on the cabinets, since it was so affordable.
I did all lower drawers in the kitchen. I did not one, but two, covered appliance garages with pull-out drawers.
I did all lower drawers and full sized cabinets in the walk-in pantry, laundry and office. And more drawers in all the bathrooms.
I had done some back-of-the-napkin calculations at the time. And in my estimate, it would’ve cost $350-400k for all the bells and whistles I went for.
That’s about 6 times as much.
I am not willing to drop that kind of cash on cabinets. It just doesn’t feel worth it to me. Wood or not.
When All is said and Done
It’s been about 6 months since we’ve moved in and the cabinets are one the features I truly love in the house. We’re using them all the time, obviously, and they feel great. Nothing flimsy about them. Almost like a car.
A Toyota is not flimsier than a Mercedes, just because it’s priced less.
And they look pretty good, if I may say so myself. It’s ironic that the reason my designer quit the project is the part that gets the most compliments from friends.
Thank you for reading! I will write some more on the specific spaces and my favorite parts about them. Stay tuned.
