Ikea kitchens

[purplepie1]

Hi

I am desperate for a new kitchen but on a budget. Current one is falling apart so can’t even replace the doors etc.

having looked around I have decided that Ikea might be a good idea.

if you have an Ikea kitchen can you send a photo please.

what did you find useful and what would you avoid if you had to buy another?

Following as curious

I like my Ikea kitchen. But I would definitely say do not go for a laminate work surface. Mine started to damage only weeks after fitting and almost a year on, there have been no resolution, although Ikea have accepted responsibility.

Other than that though, it's a lovely kitchen. The fitter they used is a real perfectionist and has been back twice to do additional work for me.

Has anyone bought from ikea and installed them themselves?

This! About to replace ours after 3-4 years. Fitted the kitchen ourselves. 1 door is wonky and can't get it straight. Something to do with our floor level I reckon.
Added the lights that switch on when you open drawer/doors which is fab. Love the farm house style sink. Would buy again if I were to replace it. At the end of the day most kitchens are simply laminated doors but for much more money.
Only thing I regret is that went for the boring cream/white doors.

Absolutely love ours.

It took aaaages though as among other things, the worktops kept arriving damaged or wrong measurements.

We used an IKEA nominated installer but it didn't help with comms when things went wrong. I still had to do all the phone calls and explain problems from start to finish every single time as it was a new call agent each time.

It was really stressful tbh and I would probably have gone in to see them had we lived closer to a store. The phone lines were infuriating.

The design service was brilliant, it's a shame the whole experience wasn't as positive for us.

(The double oven wasn't IKEA but everything else was).

We have an IKEA kitchen! It's been wonderful - DP and his dad fitted it in about 3 days (top cupboards, bottom cupboards then cutting and fitting worktops)

My tips are:

Definitely use the planner, it's so helpful to make sure everything fits.

Expect something to go wrong - we wanted drawers either side of the oven but one set was too close to the adjacent cupboard door and we couldn't open the drawers properly.

Jig around pipes! We have a corner unit that has part of the carcass showing because there were so many pipes in that corner and they didn't want to compromise the integrity of the unit. It looks weird having the white carcass and the green doors (we picked bodarp and still love it) I just wish that 4 inches of white wasn't there 😭

I have a Voxtorp in Dark Grey. It was fitted by the previous owners. I don’t love it, but I don’t hate it either; it’s not my taste but it is practical. I particularly like the deep drawers with hidden drawers inside or the cupboards with drawers inside. I also like that we’ve been able to change a few bits (door to cover the washing machine, added some internal shelves/drawers) by just chosing the parts we need, picking up instore and fitting ourselves.

My dream is to replace it and completely redo the downstairs layout with a gorgeous bespoke job but I haven’t found a magical money tree yet. In a choice between an old, broken kitchen or an Ikea one, I’d go for the Ikea one!

We had IKEA fit our utility room. Honestly wouldn't use them again. We used their installers
On the day it was supposed to be installed they phoned us to say it was out of stock- and would be another 3 months for the cupboard doors to be ready to be delivered
They then took 4 more times to get the doors delivered- as they were damaged. 6 months after the install was supposed to be done, and with damage to the boiler (they wired some lights into it and we had to change the boiler as a result), it was done.... Wish we had gone to Howdens....

Just as a counterpoint, our laminate Ikea worktop is still going strong almost 6 years later and looks great!

IMHO all normal priced kitchens are basically the same chipboard units, then you pay for fancy doors and handles. So no reason not to go for the cheapest! The great thing about ikea is that if anything breaks you can just pop and buy a new
one.

The only negative I can think of is the back panel of the units is a little flimsy.

Also ikea units are slightly deeper than most other kitchens so you get more surface space! Also a reason to get your worktop from ikea as then it all matches.

Name changed for this! Here's our IKEA kitchen that we installed 5 years ago. We really like it. It's held up well, with the exception of the circular corner cupboards, which have had issues with the rotating fixtures, but they may not have been installed as well as they could.

We have laminate worktops and they're still in great condition.

We designed it ourselves, and had our own kitchen fitters install it. It came out at quite a reasonable price.

@Ikea6799 love the blue tiles 😍

Our only experience of an Ikea kitchen was the one that came with a previous house. It was an old door design (Ulriksdal?), I believe from the early 2000s, that comprised loads of awful vertical ridges which were impossible to keep clean (or at least for the PO, we ripped it out as soon as we got the keys!)

Overall, it was terrible quality (it was only a few years old when we bought the house as the fitting date was written inside) with lots of broken bits - particularly drawers/doors hanging off/handles rusted/worktop very chipped etc. It was enough to put me off their kitchens for life, although they always look great in the shops (and we do like their storage solutions, having installed Bestas and Pax in boot rooms/utilities several times!)

Perhaps they've improved the quality since, but imo they're a basic flat pack kitchen that's ok if you don't expect it to last too long. I'd rather buy a decent quality ex-display or preloved kitchen for a similar price that can be repainted when you want a change of colour and will last for decades. Our current painted solid oak, in-frame kitchen with lots of pan drawers cost less than £300 on eBay as it was second hand. I expect it to outlive me 😉

We previously had an IKEA kitchen and had a look at using them for our utility room recently.

The big downside is that they have quite a limited range of unit sizes in comparison with other kitchen suppliers. It was going to be very difficult in particular to fit one around our boiler and consumer unit and we would also have ended up with a larger gap at the end of a base unit run.

We ended up getting it from DIY kitchens because their comparable range (foil-wrapped) came out very similar price wise to IKEA but we could get a better design.

Me

We designed and installed ours about 10/12 years ago. I built them, DH fitted them. We also did all the tracking required so that the electrician was in and out in a couple of hours.

The only thing we messed up was the dishwasher door, but it was no big deal to just get a new one

The one thing we did do was to get a granite work top and splash backs. , makes a relatively cheap kitchen look a lot more then it was

thanks for the tip on the work top. It has to last a long time and this the most used part of a kitchen. I’ve seen a worktop in a kitchen before and I am sure it’s stone, doesn’t mark or scratch and is super easy to clean. I’ll have to find out what it is.

White would be my top choice as my kitchen is north facing and the window is higher up. I am worried that it will be boring so I’m looking at a different colour for the base units or a coloured glass splash back. Lots to think about 🤔

Thank you, i think the same, a good quality worktop and splashback ties it all in

Would love a matching splashback and worktop though

OP, mine is 11 years old and looks fab still. It's the grey farmhouse one (bodbyn?). LOVE the big farmhouse butler sink. I have wooden worktops and they still look great. I bought the oil but haven't actually redone them yet 🫣. I used the IKEA planners to do the plan. As in got them to plan it.

Only tiny issue is that one of the drawer fronts next to the dishwasher has damaged slightly. I'm guessing from the steam? I only noticed it a week ago! It's not noticeable but I'm cross it's happened. Actually considering getting a new drawer front and changing it. Just because I know it's there?

I had a v expensive magnet kitchen fitted in previous house. Honestly, the IKEA is much better quality. I only lived with the magnet one 2 years and I regretted it quickly. No damage as such. But it didn't 'work' as well. And for 3x the price too!

If I could change anything, it would be more tall cupboards. As in floor to ceiling. I have loads of drawer/pan drawers as recommended on here. All fab. But I miss the storage for tall things like mop 🫣

Best thing we did , 12 years on and it looks as good as the day it was installed .

I use a microfibre cloth to keep it clean and every now and then I give it a good polish

That's a couple I still have on my phone

Where abouts are you?

Our IKEA kitchen is over 9 years old and I'm still really happy with it. It looks as good as new - the estate agent who valued our house recently was surprised that it wasn't newer.

I put a lot of thought into the layout, combining different unit sizes, cupboards, drawers and pull-outs to make it work for us. Everything still functions perfectly, including some heavily loaded drawers and corner carousels, although we've had a couple of repairs to the washing machine over the years.

Our biggest spend was on the quartz worktop. It's easy to look after (needs no special care besides being careful with acidic things like lemon juice) and hard wearing.

9 years on I still love my IKEA kitchen and will use them again if we need a new kitchen when we move.