Hi Martin, If you go down this route I would make sure that you request samples that are painted onto the same substructure that your kitchen will be made from. It is also extremely important to look at these samples alongside any other finishes going into your future kitchen such as worktops, flooring, wall colour, to check the colours as these colours will look different in different setting depending on the aspect of the room and amount of light. I would also make sure that the person making your kitchen produces scaled plans, elevations and detail drawings of your future kitchen for you to check before it goes into manufacture so that there are no nasty surprises at the end.

As an interior designer we often get kitchens made bespoke and as long as you are very diligent in checking all the drawings and finishes it will work out perfectly for you as you will be able to have the kitchen designed exactly how you want it.

Sorry I can't help,

We did just have our DIY kitchen installed last week. We choose Linwood painted in their own colour Carbon which is a dark grey/black/blue! (it looks differently at different times of the day!) We are very impressed with the quality, our builder who is a carpenter, says they are fantastic.

Our walls are straight runs, so no corners or anything difficult so we designed layout ourselves.

We asked them for a sample but despite their customer services being very helpful they said they couldn't provide a bespoke colour sample.

That's good to hear Ellie. We were considering howdens but they don't have the navy in the right shaker style we want.

You can buy Primed and Sanded doors from various suppliers therefore you can add your own top coat so you’d know exactly what the finish colour would be.

If they can’t provide a sample then you might have to be prepared to accept whatever it turns out to be - or choose another company.

We paid an extra £500 for bespoke colour and asked for a sample with a local ish supplier. It turned up an almost bright cobalt blue instead of the F&B off black we ordered. Took us a couple of weeks (with the kitchen company we ordered through, in agreement that it was nowhere near the right colour) arguing with them about it but they eventually went back to their paint mix company and got another sample done which was correct. I would have been gutted to have had them as they might have been as they don’t always get it right.

There are 100's of happy customers that went down the bespoke route and all seem to be happy with the colour matching, Also lots of people matched up their existing core colours to Farrow and Ball again with rest success. I think unless you are putting your new units against some other units painted in Farrow and Ball you will be ok.

I ended up painting our Helmsley units myself and that turned out to be a lot easier than I thought, only because ur kitchen order got stuck into the paint line fault they experienced earlier this year. I cannot fault the company, even in adverse time they customer service was outstanding.

I have agonised weeks if not months over our colours and honest to God I wished I saved myself the hassle now its all in, turns out it wasn't near as life and death as I made it out to be in my head. Enjoy the process the quality for the price of DIY cannot be beat... trust me I've been down in circles far too long about that decision too LOL

BTW DIY have tons of bespoke kitchens on their site also a quick Instagram search will give you access to real life people that went down the bespoke route and can answer your questions a bit better. Railings is a very popular choice .

DIY buy their kitchens from a main trade supplier. Many others offer the same kitchens.

@Daisy England we're already painted our old units in railings to see what it looks like, it's more of a question how good the colour match is.

@Monica thanks. How did you paint them exactly, brush, spray gun? Was it a long process? Guess we could always do that if it doesn't come out right.

Daisy, they manufacture their own units in their West Yorkshire factory., INNOVA and Diy are the same family owned business .

I used Little and Greene's Flat Oil Eggshell and the Two fussy blokes rollers. I did a TON of research and it was very straight forward because all of the hard work was already done in the priming. I am not sure if DIY would let you purchase the units primed, might be worth asking. They offered it to us as an option to make it right. We had paid for the kitchen before their paint line failed and they didn't informed us. By the time we came to choose our delivery date they realised that they cannot fulfil the order. So they offered us a discount and a ready to paint primed kitchen. I took my time and was impressed on the finish I achieved, my neighbour a professional painter decorator was on stand by in case I messed it up, he was impressed with the results too. It definitely gave me the confidence to do it again, BUT saying all of that the factory spray finish is amazing so I would choose that if I had the option.

I have no doubt in my mind that you will love the quality and the colour match, most people I stalk on Insta are well pleased but I understand of course that this is just hear say and the importance of seeing a sample.

We used DIY kitchens and went for Downpipe. We didn't get a colour match sample but chose the colour based on a sample pot of F&B downpipe from B&Q - the colour was as per the tester pot. These photos are a little old as were taken from before the kitchen was finished but it should give you an idea of what it looks like. If you would like me to take any current shots in better lighting, just let me know. To give you another idea of how accurate we found it, we also ordered a bathroom vanity unit in downpipe and we actually used one of the end panels from DIY kitchens with this other company's unit and they matched perfectly.

Ps it might be worth asking who does their paint matching ie if it’s a brand as you can get a sample done yourself first. Also be aware that a small tester pot might not be accurate and my colour mixers always tell me if it won’t be the same so you might have to buy a bigger pot.

I tried to get a f&b copy at b&q but they only scan the colour. He did it 3 times and each time - due to light change and shadows, it came up with a variety of different colour ingredients! Lol.

@Monica thanks that is reassuring. They sent us some pictures of someone who did it and they look good

@jessa61 that looks great

@Tani H-S yeah B&Q seem vary random with their matching. When I did it they scanned it there were loads of different scans saved on their computer under the same FB name. I think FB changed their sample sheets shade to stop others copying recently as well so that's not going to help. Will never go down the colour matching route again when buying the paint, spent more on testers than just getting the real thing

Yes painting kitchen is out specialty you can choose any color or finish .Paint samples on small section etc .any designer colours F&B.little green.paint and paper.etc eco friendly paints only !!! heat protection and durability matching any color .Greate choice

@Martin - it’s going to look amazing ! Can’t wait to see after photos. DIY colour matching is usually pretty good, from what I’m told.