Ikea cabinets: pros and cons

I don't have personal experience but a friend does and says they are a PITA to put together/install.

Check out the blog House Tweaking. She just put in an Ikea Kitchen and is pleased with it.

www.housetweaking.com/2012/07/20/installing-our-ikea-kitchen/

Some friends used IKEA cabinets to redo their entire kitchen, but they hired a crew to assemble and install the cabinets. They are pretty pleased, 2 years later.

Domerjen is putting them in her kitchen. You should page her and see what her experience has been.

DH and I put them in 3 years ago. They still look great and we've been very happy. We definitely ran into a few challenges installing them, but it would be a stretch to say it was HARD. I'm not sure how they could possibly make it easier. The fact that you can put them together and install them yourself speaks volumes. If you're not confident you can do it yourself, you can have Ikea do it for you.

Putting the first cabinet together takes a little time, but after that they are all the same and you could do it in your sleep. I put all the cabinets together in a few hours in front of the TV. Hanging the cabinets is pretty simple- you hang a track on the wall and then attach all the wall cabinets to it. The challenge is ensuring that everything is level and that you've measured very carefully (not an issue that's specific to Ikea cabinets, obviously.)

The drawer and cabinet hardware is really awesome. We didn't upgrade to anything better and I don't think you can. They all have the soft close feature and they still work perfectly after 3 years. We bought cabinet knobs, drawer pulls, countertops and appliances elsewhere so our entire kitchen doesn't look straight out of an Ikea catalog. No regrets.

Are these wood or particle board?

I thought all Ikea cabinets are particle board? Are they dove tail joints?

DH made all our door fronts and drawer fronts but used Ikea cabinet boxes to save money. The actual cabinets are fine but ditto upgrading all the hinges and drawer slides. We used Ikea pulls as well and they are pretty decent quality and look modern.

On another note, we used an Ikea kitchen faucet and also bathroom vanity and netiher are good quality. We've been here for 2 years and they are already showing signs of wear and not looking as nice as when we installed them. I'd be wary of most Ikea finishes and would NEVER do an entire kitchen in Ikea stuff.

We have one that we put above our toilet in the bathroom. It works fine. Looks decent.

I have always had an issue with getting ikea doors to hang right, though which would be a major problem if you had a kitchen full of them.

Thanks!

All the IKEA cabinet boxes are particle board. This isn't a HUGE deal - if you go to Home Depot & look at the low end KraftMade cabinets, they are particle board too. HOWEVER in my experience, they do not hold up. Particularly if you have pull out shelves and put heavy stuff on them (pots & pans). The particle board pulls apart where they shelf hardware attaches.

Kraftmade offers 2 other levels of quality - plywood sides w/ particle board bases/tops and all plywood construction. Of course you'll pay more for that quality too.

Problem is that they are veneer, mostly. One scratch and they are ruined. I am much harder on my kitchen than that.

Exactly this. I thought I was going to have to shell out 20k for cabinets! Now the reno seems like it is tangible for us!

Thanks for all the replies and for the link to that blog. DH and I are certainly handy so I am not at all concerned about putting the cabinets together - we've purchased many an Ikea product, and we also gutted and renovated our last house in its entirety. DH is against Ikea cabinets but I am considering them. That other site is tempting, I sent the link to DH - now we are fighting over shades of white. #firstworldproblems

THANK YOU!