| You
must have seen the adverts –
"Your
made-to-measure kitchen for the price of a flat-pack!"
The
vast majority of kitchens are however made to standardised sizes.
Imagine if every kitchen was made to order! The intricate designs
within doors would have to be duplicated – but very slightly smaller.
It would be very difficult indeed for a kitchen company to start
manufacturing some doors at 437.7mm wide with a double carcass
internal width of 841.4mm, assuming a carcass width of 17mm.
 And
in addition to the immense challenge for the kitchen company to
produce such a size – for the average kitchen there really is
no point! However, it is a very saleable commodity for a kitchen
company to market its services by announcing that it’s kitchens
are custom made. Custom made is of course a relative phrase
and never applies to every part of the kitchen – think about the
worktops, cornice, plinth etc.
Most
kitchen doors sold in this country are pre-made in 300, 400, 500
and 600mm (12 inch, 16 inch, 20 inch and 24 inch) sizes. Kitchens
can still look superb whilst sticking to these four particular
door widths – and on the bright side, greater standardisation
should of course mean a reduction in cost due to economies of
scale. (Notice the should in that particular sentence!)
The most important
consideration should be how practical and appropriate the kitchen
style and quality is for your particular home.
Only very,
very rarely would a kitchen designer come up with an occasion
when a wholly custom-made piece of furniture is required.
Virtually
every kitchen within the present marketplace will have some sort
of ‘filler panel’ in it - fillers are much more common than you
think. It's a great way to hide the fact that you can't use space.
For
example, if a row of kitchen units begins with a tall oven-housing
unit next to the wall, to give reasonable access to the appliance
it is necessary to bring it out a few centimetres. (Refer to figure
2 in Kitchen Secret 7) It is also quite common for a filler panel
to be utilised next to the first wall cabinet in a corner. Commonly,
walls aren’t straight. This means that it works better to fix
the first wall cabinet a few centimetres from the corner
and then use the blended filler to take the ‘look and feel’ all
the way to the wall. One other reason why such a cabinet would
also start out a few centimetres from the wall is the fact that
the door would struggle to open properly otherwise.
Quality
in a kitchen doesn’t arrive from making something to order. Quality
comes from fixing something together & ensuring that it remains
‘flush’.
One
more secret that kitchen companies use to make sure that your
kitchen lies in the right place is to alter the size of the worktop.
Worktops generally come in 3 sizes – 600, 700 and 900mm deep.
If your kitchen base needs to be ‘stretched’ due to a squint wall
or the location of a fixed appliance such as a cooker, then the
fitter has the option of placing the front of the cabinet at a
location that he prefers and working back by ‘scribing’ the worktop
to the correct size and shape. The size of the cabinets remains
the same, however the ‘gap’ behind them increases.
The
final area
to consider when designing a kitchen with fixed sized cabinets
is immovable objects. Whether they are  electricity
sockets, a stop tap for the water, an electricity meter or a gas
meter. All these objects can be planned around as long as enough
planning goes into it. For instance, you need to make sure that
your kitchen designer hasn’t made one electrical socket almost
impossible to use due to its location. It’s what you do with it
that counts. Remember that most kitchen companies use the same,
standard sizes. Most, if not all of what you want can be accomplished.
As long as if some thought is put into it!
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