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Renovating Kitchens

What are some things you regret in your kitchen remodel?

6 years ago

Have you done a complete kitchen remodel? What are some of your biggest regrets? Likewise, what are somethings that if you had to do it all over again you would (i.e put in a walk in pantry vs a pull-out etc. I know there's so many temptations these days with this website and Pinterest providing endless photos of beautifully decked out kitchens. Just looking for a friendly discussion :)

Comments (3)

User
6 years ago
The best thing we did-

We have an additional back family foyer/ mud room that had one of those builder standard desks that is next to our kitchen we have to pass to get to the walk in pantry. I took out the built in desk and extended the kitchen by adding a stack of 30" wide drawers and a 15" cabinets, I also added upper cabinets an X Bin wine box and relocated the under mount microwave from the main part of the kitchen, this gave us so much more storage and added a wine/ coffee bar which helps with flow of traffic when entertaining. I use the bottom drawer for all my appliances,

like an appliance garage. I have counter tops and outlets so it's quick and easy to use the toaster and such and then get it stored away quickly. I also love how I have a counter top to directly throw the grocery's when I'm coming in at the end of the day with my little ones. I was hesitant about taking the microwave out of the main kitchen area but love loosing the eye sore in my open concept kitchen/ dining and living space and that I was able to make room for a double oven.
emilyam819
6 years ago
I put in an OTR microwave because I thought a micro had to be built in and I didn’t want to sacrifice cabinet space elsewhere. Now I wish I just bought a small micro to sit on the counter. When the OTR dies, I’ll replace it with a hood.

I love everything else I did!
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Thank you for everyone's comments, had no idea this thread would prove so popular when I started it. We are plastering this week and we have finally bought most things for the kitchen. I did find some real 'finds' though if anyone is looking. Not sure where you are based, but regarding electrical goods we researched all our own and narrowed down our list, and once we had that we looked online for the best prices for each appliance. Instead of buying from lots of different places we took it to Bentalls, who not only matched, but also cost us less, and beat some online prices with a good 'deal' price they also then will hold on to them until you need them, but if anything goes wrong you have 'bentalls' rather than several online dealers to return items to. RDO Appliances also do this if there is one near you, but i'd advise you to research prices first. Another thing we found was inserts for the kitchens. Through our kitchen supplier these were expensive, bin inserts, pull out drawers, pull out larders, even the pop up sockets, sourced seperately through ebay and online we managed to save quite a lot of money by doing this, so our fitter will still have the right things on the day, but we are not getting the inserts from the supplier. What else..... erm kitchen worktop, unbelievably the exact same worktop, same material, same cut outs etc.. same sizes differed between suppliers by 3k! so do shop around for your quartz and granite.
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6 years ago
Not using more base cabinet drawers. Not getting matching door panels on the ends of cabinets, I just used flush panels. Choosing my backsplash tile too quickly. Backsplash tile has come a long way in 12 years! Doing one of those offset sinks instead of just one large one. My husband has grown tired of our dark granite and would change it to something lighter, but I still like it.

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