I always liked IKEA kitchens, however I didn't see so far a perfect style for me. When they brought new colors of Abstrakt model I was just delighted. Our choice is Cream high gloss kitchen with black Rubik glass doors for glass top cabinet.
We ran into some complications however. IKEA furniture can't be hanging from ceiling, and I didn't want to lose the hanging units over the peninsula. They provide a lot of storage and we need it. This type of unit would cost a fortune to rebuild. Also, since my kitchen is not in a living room, and we have enough room for a table and chairs there, we have no need for open concept fashionable style. I have to say I dislike very much this open concept fashion because I don't see how someone could do serious cooking in a living room. Greasy dust would be everywhere. I also like a bigger kitchen where we can sit and have our meal. There is enough room for a TV and entertainment.
We still have a dining room for special occasions and guests.
I was watching a TV show on people purchasing property and one girl disliked very much a kitchen in the living room. Then the seller wanted to pressure her saying this was fashion, but like me she just said it was a way to sell you a smaller place for a bigger price. Yes, it is fashion, but fashions do pass. My priorities are functionality (being practical) and needs first, then nice, and in very last concern to please others with my choices. I understand however others could have different needs, and so, their choices could be different.
I am not following fashions, but rather like timeless things, since I keep them for a long time. This Abstrakt model is easy to keep clean, as it doesn't have ridges nor relief on it as our old wooden kitchen had. I really didn't hate our old kitchen, but after more than 40 years, and several painting attempts it was still very hard to keep clean.
Anyway we had to keep our top units. Also we have soffits in our house, but they are used for central heating and can't be eliminated. So, I couldn't build the upper cabinets to the ceiling. Oh well. So it is basically a combination of preferences and constraints.
But I didn't really particularly liked IKEA corner units on top cabinets, and since we couldn't go higher, we kept the old cabinets, which we refaced with IKEA doors. Now, this is not that easy, and we needed to buy Bloom brackets, which by the way fit IKEA doors with little adjustments, as they also make IKEA brackets.
I also purchased a very nice self stick white vinyl liners to cover the shelves, and we painted existing cabinets same color as the IKEA furniture. So the result is nice.
My husband suffered quite a bit with adapting brackets since each cabinet is non standard and has frames, and we wanted a frame less look. The result was nice, but everything got spoiled by the wooden finish to the soffit. He was really discouraged when I asked him to remove the strip. Since the existing material wouldn't have fitted there or would have given a heavy look (we tried), I started imagining something with unconventional finishing materials. I chose to use the aluminum profile used for ceramics borders. When we tried it, it was very nice and actually matched the handles. Then my husband arrived with a very nice idea of mounting LEDs lights under that aluminum strip, and finally is looks awesome. We chose soft light LEDs sold in rolls from electronic store. It is even possible to add a LED light dimmer if you want to get really nice results.
The bottom cabinets and the pantries are from IKEA. I chose all bottom cabinets except under sink to have drawers. One of the pantries is in a corner and is deep, however it doesn't have enough room on the side for a door, so we had to go with a pull out model to the ceiling, as there is no soffit. My husband also extended LEDs to inside the pantry.
The second pantry will be shallow 12inch.
We also created a unit on top of the refrigerator and up to the ceiling with a 24 inch deep cabinet we built ourselves with wood and using a IKEA door that we cut on a side and a set of pull up Blum brackets. These brackets cost more than the cabinet itself, but made that unused space very usable. I added inside a slide out Glidez deep shelf that can completely slide out.
We ran into some complications however. IKEA furniture can't be hanging from ceiling, and I didn't want to lose the hanging units over the peninsula. They provide a lot of storage and we need it. This type of unit would cost a fortune to rebuild. Also, since my kitchen is not in a living room, and we have enough room for a table and chairs there, we have no need for open concept fashionable style. I have to say I dislike very much this open concept fashion because I don't see how someone could do serious cooking in a living room. Greasy dust would be everywhere. I also like a bigger kitchen where we can sit and have our meal. There is enough room for a TV and entertainment.
We still have a dining room for special occasions and guests.
I was watching a TV show on people purchasing property and one girl disliked very much a kitchen in the living room. Then the seller wanted to pressure her saying this was fashion, but like me she just said it was a way to sell you a smaller place for a bigger price. Yes, it is fashion, but fashions do pass. My priorities are functionality (being practical) and needs first, then nice, and in very last concern to please others with my choices. I understand however others could have different needs, and so, their choices could be different.
I am not following fashions, but rather like timeless things, since I keep them for a long time. This Abstrakt model is easy to keep clean, as it doesn't have ridges nor relief on it as our old wooden kitchen had. I really didn't hate our old kitchen, but after more than 40 years, and several painting attempts it was still very hard to keep clean.
Anyway we had to keep our top units. Also we have soffits in our house, but they are used for central heating and can't be eliminated. So, I couldn't build the upper cabinets to the ceiling. Oh well. So it is basically a combination of preferences and constraints.
But I didn't really particularly liked IKEA corner units on top cabinets, and since we couldn't go higher, we kept the old cabinets, which we refaced with IKEA doors. Now, this is not that easy, and we needed to buy Bloom brackets, which by the way fit IKEA doors with little adjustments, as they also make IKEA brackets.
I also purchased a very nice self stick white vinyl liners to cover the shelves, and we painted existing cabinets same color as the IKEA furniture. So the result is nice.
My husband suffered quite a bit with adapting brackets since each cabinet is non standard and has frames, and we wanted a frame less look. The result was nice, but everything got spoiled by the wooden finish to the soffit. He was really discouraged when I asked him to remove the strip. Since the existing material wouldn't have fitted there or would have given a heavy look (we tried), I started imagining something with unconventional finishing materials. I chose to use the aluminum profile used for ceramics borders. When we tried it, it was very nice and actually matched the handles. Then my husband arrived with a very nice idea of mounting LEDs lights under that aluminum strip, and finally is looks awesome. We chose soft light LEDs sold in rolls from electronic store. It is even possible to add a LED light dimmer if you want to get really nice results.
The bottom cabinets and the pantries are from IKEA. I chose all bottom cabinets except under sink to have drawers. One of the pantries is in a corner and is deep, however it doesn't have enough room on the side for a door, so we had to go with a pull out model to the ceiling, as there is no soffit. My husband also extended LEDs to inside the pantry.
The second pantry will be shallow 12inch.
We also created a unit on top of the refrigerator and up to the ceiling with a 24 inch deep cabinet we built ourselves with wood and using a IKEA door that we cut on a side and a set of pull up Blum brackets. These brackets cost more than the cabinet itself, but made that unused space very usable. I added inside a slide out Glidez deep shelf that can completely slide out.
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