DIY Kitchens!!!

[YummyMummy27645]

Has anyone got a kitchen from DIY Kitchens and if so which range and colour combination would you recommend (preferably shaker style)? Open to any opinions and would love to see pics if possible. Thanks, Samantha.

I went for a Luca matt white kitchen as it looks so classy. It has no handles and looks so modern and reflects a little bit of light. I only have a small kitchen but I made the best use of it that I could. The company you mention above has shed loads of kitchen pictures that people have sent in to them. You will get hundreds of ideas from there!

Thanks for the advice Ramona, I've heard that the farrow and ball paint colours that DIY kitchens use look plasticky and cheap - don't know if you've got yours in F&B but if so what are your opinions?

Watching as I'm interested in ordering.
Has anyone visited their showroom?

Mine is a standard white colour. Although, I do struggle to see how a Farrow & Ball colour on a wooden shaker kitchen door can look plasticky & cheap. Where did you read that? A friend of mine does a lot of renovations, not just kitchens and paints a lot of wooden doors and beams etc in F&B colours.

Watching with interest too. Probably getting our new utility room kitted out by DIY.
Mixed feedback on the money saving expert forum but the value for money seems amazing.

I know that DIY kitchens wrap the wooden doors in some sort of painted foil which could maybe be the cause of the plasticky look?

Yummy where have you got that information from?

I also had the Luca in Matt White. And I went to the showroom too. Currently extending and considering another kitchen from DIY.

YummyMummy2764, I possibly see the confusion, only oak effect doors are foil wrapped. This is because they are MDF. The real solid wood doors are just that, and only painted as needed.

Those who have bought from diy, did you use their software or did you get a plan made by another supplier to help buy all the products? Worried about buying things like plinths, end panels etc.

We've got a DIY Kitchen - Luca handleless in matt Dakar (I think that's what the colour is called - it's a grey-ish sage green). It's painted wood - definitely not wrapped in anything.

They didn't have planning software when we were buying our kitchen early last year, but think they were planning to introduce it. So we used their paper planning tool. There was a checklist somewhere on the website that you could go through to help you check you'd ordered everything. Then once you've submitted your order they call you to go through it with you and check you haven't missed anything. When the order came, they had missed one thing and sent it very quickly. I then decided the integral bin was too small and, as it wasn't bespoke, they were happy for me to send it back and refund it.

We visited their showroom - it was good to see the units we wanted 'in the flesh'. I'd happily order from DIY Kitchens again.

Those of you who have ordered from DIY kitchens, do you mind me asking a rough cost of what yours came to as we were hoping to not spend more than £15k?

Mine came to £3,500. It would have been 10k with Betta living! How many kitchen units do you think you need in your kitchen?

Hi Ramona, we would want a long row of units across one wall and a large(ish) island unit plus Quartz/corian worktops and high end appliances. What sort of size and spec is your kitchen?

2 tall units, 6 wall units, 4 big base units + 1 x 1000mm wide pan drawer unit. 13 units in total + plinth, cornice, pelmet, end panels and Laminate worktop + soft close on all units. The price did not include appliances as I managed to reuse some and got some others from appliances online.

Your additional costs will come from a quartz worktop, could be looking at a few grand for that. A kitchen island is basically another kitchen so they can be as cheap or as expensive as you want them to be, put a wine cooler in there and watch the price sky rocket:-) I think you'll blitz it though for 15k.

Thanks so much Ramona, you've really put my mind at ease

I think its the extras that add - not necessarily the units. I would expect the units to come in for about £5k depending on what you want - whether you want wall units on your run of units, whether you got for "specialist" units such as the pull out bin, pull out storage etc.

Then its the extras and how high end you want to go - how long is a piece of string?! Depends on where you are in the country, how much time you can dedicate to donkey work (in terms of getting deals / face to face with local companies, ringing round quartz suppliers etc - thats what I did). Do you want quartz just on the top of your island or for the side panels too for the "wrapped" look? What about upstands? Tiles? Bespoke splashbacks? Do you want wine cooler / Quooker tap / built in coffee machine??

£15k sounds alot but it will soon disappear depending on your spec.

We have just bought a painted oak in Farrow and Ball from the Broadoak range. It cost about £5000 without appliances. We have a built in fridge and oven which adds to the cost as the side panels for the cabinets are eye-watering. It is exceptional quality and the price is about half what you would pay on the high street.

My DH is fitting it himself so is quite good with plans etc he worked it out for himself and made his own scale diagrams etc.

I'm so very grateful for all of this advice, Scuttle22 could you send a few pics of your kitchen as that's exactly what we're looking for - sorry if that sounds rude?

I would but it still boxed up in the garage! DH has demolished the kitchen and now awaiting electricians! Did you look on the website their are some good examples if you click on Broadoak bespoke and then customer reviews. I will post it but it may be in a couple of months!

there

Thanks Scuttle22 please do! We would love some opinions - should we go for harewood/Milton range or Broadoak range? (We want light grey shaker cabinets and white Quartz worktops). All opinions welcome

We are about to order the Careera in light grey with an island in F&B black blue. I am worried about the comment that the colour may look plasticky! The Careera is lacquered MDF (tiny budget) so maybe the painted look doesn't work so well as wood?Any ideas?

The Careera will look nice. It's the same door as mine but it's the version where you put a handle on it. It has no foil wrap, just paint and laquer.

Here's ours, units were around £6.5k from memory. It's a DIY kitchens Broadoak painted in F&B Purbeck Stone. Very pleased with it.

We got plans from howdens and wicks and then used them to input to DIYK site...pretty straight forward. No problems with the F&B paint finish...durable and easy to clean so far

Photos here uk.pinterest.com/hyde1571/kitchen/

We have one and no problems at all with the quality. We had Broadoak and painted it ourselves, my mum has Clayton and they both look great. Clayton might be a good choice for you. Broadoak you can faintly see the grain, Clayton is very smooth.

Couple of things:
The carcase units are as good as you will find anywhere for a chipboard kitchen, plus they have huge choice of sizes, extras, finishes etc. Really no need to worry on that front.

They do a big range of doors at different price points and so the cheaper ones will be foil wrapped, the more expensive lacquered or painted wood . I would really recommend getting sample doors if you are trying to choose between a few. Or ring them and ask them to explain the different finishes.

For the F&B colours I suspect they use a hardwearing spray paint tinted to colours licensed from F&B, but again if you get a sample it will soon become obvious. F&B themselves do a range of different paints with different finishes (matt, eggshell etc) , it is not one paint.

The DIY bit is doing your own measuring, design and parts list so if you are not confident in that then perhaps read up on it or enlist some help. But in the end you can do it on graph paper and they have lots of information on their website on how to handle corners etc.