DeVOL kitchen - is it worth it?

[lettie9]

I've been asking about kitchens on this board and receiving lots of good advice. I had in mind we'd get a mid-range kitchen from Howden's or equivalent, but now that I've looked at deVOL I am very tempted.

Can anyone talk to me about deVOL? Are they worth the price? I like their real shaker and classic English, and I think we will be getting a 8-unit kitchen plus island.

Or would you recommend another company that's a level up from Howden's/Wren?

Thank you!

We've got one. It's certainly better quality than the standard high street kitchen, especially the cupboard door hinges and latches, none of which have broken after 10 years of heavy use. (Those Ikea hinges are useless!)

Our builder/carpenter, who installed it for us, pointed out that the joinery was not great - there were small gaps between, say, the top of a cupboard door and the cupboard frame. And the drawers, when closed, are not all perfectly flush with the frame. So it's not quite on a par with a really top-of-the-range wooden kitchen. But I wouldn't have noticed if he hadn't pointed it out.

The paint colours are really nice, too, if you like the subtle Farrow & Ball style.

Thank you @Squiblet
That's a bit disappointing about the joinery. I'm all about the aesthetic but you'd think for that price it would be perfectly made too. Was the price off the scale?

Yeah they are very average for the price. I don't use them in my house flipping business.

@121hugsneeded hmm. Though arguably you wouldn't get a high end kitchen anyway if you're flipping for a profit.

May I ask who would you recommend?

I really wanted a deVol kitchen but it was just going to be too expensive and this isn't our forever home so we went with Handmade Kitchens of Christchurch.

The units are wood and you paint them yourself so you can have any colour you like. They're highly recommended on here for Shaker style and I've been impressed with them.

This is their website

@SollaSollew thank you for this - do they have showrooms or are they online only?

I'm getting a HMKOC kitchen at the moment but lead times are very long. They're also rebranding, this is their fancier site! daveyandalger.co.uk/

Showrooms in Dorset and Surrey

I use high end stuff actually, as they are high value flips . Plain English is my 'go to' for kitchens at the moment with DIY Helmsley for the laundry areas

At the moment they cost around the same as Harvey Jones and Hammonds; and are far superior to either of them. For negotiation purposes it’s worth getting a quote from Smallbones too. They were only a few grand more for us.

I'm getting a bit brain-fried from all the choice. I'm going to go to John Lewis for a kitchen consultation to clear my head!

I had my heart set on deVol; I love their Haberdashers and Sebastian Cox kitchens. But then I decided the cost was OTT, and we are going with IKEA carcasses with bamboo doors by Custom Fronts instead.

I've got a HKOC kitchen on order too !

@VenusClapTrap how's your kitchen getting on? Still hmm-ing and haa-ing about mine, but Custom Fronts are definitely in the mix, that bamboo style is gorgeous.

Christ church kitchens are beautiful, to the PP who suggested them. But my inability to make it to a showroom is a real problem.

I looked at Devol and plain English.
Plain English have a cheaper offshoot which comes without a designer. But it is the same quality (excellent)
britishstandardcupboards.co.uk/

My cousin went with British standard. She is very happy.
They’re on my list for when I redo.
I’m currently stuck with a magnet kitchen!

I have a John Lewis kitchen in my FTB flat (now rented) and a DeVOL kitchen where I live currently. The John Lewis kitchen is fine and still looking OK after 9 years, but has peeled
a little in places and isn’t repairable. The DeVOL one is lovely but our mistake was not getting DeVOL to fit it. It was though cheaper than we expected. Because of the shape of the kitchen the doors sometimes bang into things (such as the corners of the cooker hood) and dent but it’s fixable with filler and paint.

@Zinnia it’s all still a bit of a building site at the moment. But the doors should be arriving imminently - I can’t wait to see them!

Thanks for the tip @Onestep2021 British Standard looks beautiful. Website does refer to a designer though - or is it not free?

@mobear are your JL units solid wood or MDF? Having seen a couple now in showrooms I'd like to go with solid wood - feel like it looks better and should last longer?

@lettie9 The John Lewis kitchen is MDF. I think wood will definitely wear better in the long-term (as you can repair it) but in the short-term it dents and scuffs much more easily than my John Lewis kitchen did, which took me by surprise. The paint also bubbled when I used a baby steriliser under it, although it handles the kettle fine.

We’re about to commission another kitchen for a house we bought recently and this time we’re going with a small business who only make bespoke kitchens (I would have used DeVOL again but we don’t want shaker this time). They use wood veneer. I suspect the wood veneer will fall somewhere between the MDF and wood in terms of hardiness, but I’m comforted by the fact we can always contact the maker to repair or replace a unit if needed.

I always had in mind that if John Lewis discontinued the range my kitchen came from I wouldn’t be able to replace a damaged unit. Luckily when a unit did get damaged years ago (from a leak upstairs) they still did it but I’m not sure if they do anymore.

@mobear thank you for that! I hadn't realised. Sigh.

But if we're going with MDF, why not just IKEA?

Argh!

@lettie9 I actually intended to get IKEA when I got the John Lewis kitchen but I found the whole process so confusing and frustrating I gave up. This was 10 years ago though so maybe the service has improved since then.

I came across this recently and would have very seriously considered it but unfortunately our kitchen is an awkward shape and really will benefit from bespoke (The A Collection): www.askogeng.no/

Apparently there are different grades of MDF, I've just been told by a friend. How incredibly confusing.

I went to John Lewis of Hungerford recently - not to be confused with John Lewis - who used only MDF for painted kitchens, and whilst I recognised they were quality units, I just didn't like the look at all. Very plasticky. We have a trip to John Lewis (not of Hungerford) planned this week, so will check out their MDF.

A friend has just had a British Standard kitchen delivered, she ordered at the start of this year with design included, and was told their design service would become chargeable shortly afterwards, so by now I think you'll have to pay for it. Probably redeemable or partially so by purchase though?

@VenusClapTrap exciting! Can I persuade you to post a picture of two when it's done?

I am generally of the opinion that doors take more of a bashing than carcasses; case in point: our Ikea kitchen is still going strong internally although the MDF/foiled doors are showing the effects of having lived with two clumsy adults young children for the last decade.

I have been suckered into looking again at the fabled Helmsley range from DIY kitchens, which seems the most cost-effective way of achieving the DeVOL/Plain English "look", but also considering Ikea + Custom Fronts (whose bamboo range is similar to the fabulous Norwegian ones linked by @mobear), and Naked Kitchens who do beautiful solid wood doors and can also supply extra units.

Handmade Kitchens (not sure about the rebrand, I've already forgotten the name) are now booking for January '22, so too late for us. I got a quote from them earlier this year and it was extremely reasonable, but we decided against going with them for a few reasons, none of which were related to the quality or cost of their offering, which were both impressive.