Forums DIY Kitchens Reply To: Kitchens August 19, 2019 at 4:35 pm #505 burton 25 Posts I’ve done two kitchens myself – all the thick lads at school are now tradesmen so I figured it couldn’t be that hard ;-). Online design tools are useful. Think hard about things like opening space for doors and drawers. Think about the ‘golden triangle’ you work in (stove, sink, fridge). Use odd gaps for storing baking trays / bottles. Some carcasses require end panels on the side of tall fridge/oven units or end units. Consider not putting doors on everything – for example corner unit doors are a pain (either open one to open the other, or a bi-fold arrangement that gets sloppy over time) and it’s easier just to have things on display (we put nice crock pots and recipe books in ours). Use drawers below worktop height as it’s loads easier to get to things at the back. ‘Magic’ low level corner cupboards are loads better than carousel ones which get jammed when you spin them too fast and things fall off inside. Soft close drawers are great. Wide cutlery drawers are a pain compared to narrow ones. Consider worktop depth (front to back) to ensure you have space behind units for pipes. It doesn’t really matter if you use units with voids or not, they’ll all be screwed to the worktop which will be attached to the wall somehow. Decent tap and sink is essential as you use them all the time – we went for a tall tap with flexy hose nozzle. Let pros fit stone worktops so they have to replace them at their cost if they break them. Solid wood worktops can be cheaper than you think – we went for rubberwood. It’s ‘varnished’ with Osmo hardwax oil and doing well. B&Q kitchens are all flatpack – cheaper to buy than built carcasses, but expensive to have fitted due to higher labour costs. Invariably something like handles doesn’t turn up in your order. Proper cooker hood extracting to outside is loads better than recirculating ones. Use 6″ duct instead of 4 to get better extraction if you can. Rooms without parallel (or vertical!) walls are a ballache.