IKEA kitchen with custom doors

[lettie9]

I've been harassing everyone on this board about designing my new kitchen - I'm after a white shaker style with solid wood doors and stone top.

A few posters suggested I get an IKEA kitchen and custom doors. I'm opening up to this idea! I've looked at Naked Doors, Foxstow and Superfronts - but can anyone help me decide? How do they differ on cost roughly, and who would you recommend? I'm veering towards ND, mostly because their website seems the simplest and I've read good reviews.

I've also read that IKEA kitchens can be problematic because they're deeper than normal, and you can only get an IKEA dishwasher? So is it actually worthwhile doing this (is this cheaper or will look nicer), or shall I get just a (for example) Wren kitchen?

Actually used Foxstow - by custom I meant bespoke. Kitchens for most people are all about compromises and choices. We choose to internally insulate the exterior walls and lost about 40mm to that - hence squeezing space for the broom cupboard. Internal insulation is great in an old house😀

@Zinnia Naked Doors are now £164 incl. VAT for 60x80cm IKEA door shaker style! I can't believe the difference between mine and your figure

@SallyLockheart yes... my husband keeps talking about internal insulation, but 4cm seems a lot and it's a lot of work did you get it done everywhere?

Just in the kitchen diner. That included plasterboard. We were knocking the kitchen, utility and outside storage sheds into one bigger room - and had 2.5 external walls. We were stripping back to brick anyway - one window made bigger, one smaller and another knocked together with door to make French doors. External walls not suitable for cavity wall insulation. No brainer in the circumstances - more difficult to embark on otherwise

Ah totally makes sense if you're having significant structural work done anyway.

@lettie9 the price I quoted below was for a slab door, shaker from Naked was £124 when I did my comparison. That would have been excl VAT. The painted slab have gone up from £93 to £100 now but I expect that's thanks to the rocketing price of timber

Aha that's less outrageous. Expensive eh.
I assume it's possible to buy units from IKEA WITHOUT the doors?

Absolutely. We had the design worked out by IKEA kitchen planners which then generated a very detailed parts list. You have to buy each part separately anyway including hinges etc

And just not buy the doors

Following with interest as we're thinking of having wood doors and new worktops put on our existing IKEA kitchen.
Would the company supplying the doors do the measuring for you? And would you have to paint the whole thing, as the new doors wouldn't be the exact same colour as the side of the cabinets?

The companies doing IKEA specific doors just need to know the cabinet sizes and whether it is a METOD cabinet or one if the earlier ones. The doors are produced to fit the cabinets including hinge holes in the same place as IKEA original doors.

@SallyLockheart where did you get your handles etc. if you don't mind me asking?

I'm now considering the floor to ceiling cupboard idea! I assume you store things you don't need often up there? Do you have a ladder?? I've seen them and they look nice.

I got mine from Yesterhome - mixture of knobs and handles. They were mid price- though not entirely sure you could tell that much difference between cheaper ones when you look at them 😮. But they feel good and solid and well balanced if that makes sense.

Yes store not often used items up. Small folding steps in broom cupboard

Small folding step - such fab idea. Did IKEA provide or custom made?

So funny you said Yesterhome as that's currently what I'm looking at - I love their look www.yesterhome.com/products/classic-bow-handle

The cups are classic but I've always had handles and will probably stick with them out of habit.

Hah. I have those on drawers, knobs on doors.
Folding steps and readily available - think mine were from Screwfix

Oh i see! I was imagining a little step attached to the inside of the cupboard that folded out! Over-engineered

Hafele do folding steps that fit in a cabinet or plinth drawer (I have these currently and putting them into new kitchen too but you do have to then raise the height of the Ikea units, as the minimum plinth depth if you have a drawer in them is 120mm and Ikea plinths are 80mm). Drawers from https://www.drawerboxes.co.uk ("plinth pods")