Anyone happy with or regretted built in furniture for bedroom or study or workspace?

[Renovateur]

I'm considering getting some built in furniture but am frightened of that over-mirrored sliding door look and worry about buyers remorse.

It's for a bedroom but I would like to have some concealed storage for books and for art supplies.

I did look at this once before years ago but was put off because it all seemed very standardised products shoved into fit - for example the shelves were all only a pre-set thickness and I wanted much thinner shelves to get more in and for a less 'chunky look'.

Can anyone recommend a company or talk about their experiences positive or negative?

Also if you are going to redecorate a whole room and you were going to put in fitted furniture what order would you do - painting, carpet and furniture?

Please help me with your ideas.

I had a fitted wardrobe installed when I moved here. Some people might not like the mirrored sliding door look but I am quite happy with it. There is much more storage than with free standing furniture and it helps with a room that is not particularly big. I could store books instead of clothes in the shelving area, if I wished.
I recommend using a small, local company, not a national company. They will be more likely to make just what you want and be cheaper.
I would do furniture first, then painting, then carpet - with blinds/curtains at the same time as carpet.

I haven't done built-ins, but had them as a teenager and didn't love them. I like to be able to rearrange as needed.

Now we use a mix of antiques and some of the more traditional-looking ikea pieces. It's worked really well and we have tons of storage that way.

If I were doing a whole room from scratch, I'd replace the wall-to-wall carpeting with hardwood, then paint, then buy furniture, area rugs, and draperies. If when doing the floors you can ditch the wall radiator for underfloor heating, even better!

Oh, also, if a bedroom, my first purchase would be super quiet motorized black out shades.

@Londontrees
I recommend using a small, local company, not a national company. They will be more likely to make just what you want and be cheaper.

I haven't looked at this but I did previously and small companies seemed to be as expensive, have less guarantee that the work was going to be good (it's hard to be sure whether reviews and photos are genuine) but have less options for clever storage devices - like half level rails that pull down and out for access for example.

I was hoping some people might answer who had had good experiences with this kind of thing.

We did use a local joiner and I would recommend this route. Try asking around or on local websites and see if you can find genuine recommendations.

However we used Ikea Pax carcasses (and one of their other ranges, I forget which) and then got the joiner to make bespoke doors, filler panels, and some extra top cupboards to fit around the carcasses and make it all look built in. This way we could use the clever Pax solutions and also save money compared with the whole thing being bespoke, but get the look of bespoke built in plus the extra bits (like top cupboards) we needed.

We’ve used Sliderobes for 3 wardrobes now. Yes, we have a bit of a mirrored look going on but they have a lot of options so you can have what you like. Have built the insides to our specs, including drawers, shelves, area for my makeup and make mirror. It works really well so don’t need chests of drawers in the bedrooms. Youngest dd use half of her wardrobe for her things and the rest for ours. Wine shelves etc.

Previous owners had built-in wardrobes in the main bedroom. They’d used a local joiners to do the work. Not a mirrored door in sight. I’d definitely look at local joiners for a quote.

We have built in wardrobes. Local company, really nice, cost about half of what Sharps had quoted.

We also used a local joiner - found through Facebook on a local community page with a lot of positive feedback from others in our village. Way cheaper than getting a big company in and he was super flexible and made suggestions based on what we wanted. I was so happy with what he did and it was exactly what I wanted (and even better really).