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Importance of High Quality Cabinet Materials

When it comes to building your dream kitchen, it’s both an investment in your home and your personal vision for how you want that home to look and be enjoyed. For these very important reasons, it’s equally important to ensure the quality of your cabinets is up to the challenge of meeting all expectations – performing well, looking as great as the day you bought them for the duration of your time in the home, as well as increase the value of your house should you ever choose to sell in the future. Although your cabinets may just be one part of your home, they’re the foundation of your kitchen – and the kitchen is the heart of the home!

When it comes to ensuring the quality of your cabinets, it comes down to two main facets – the quality of the materials, and the quality of the craftsmanship. If you have any questions in regards to either, we are happy to be a resource to guide you on a confident path when making your selections. Additionally, we strongly advise against performing the installation yourself  – cabinets are extremely complex and since there are so many pieces working together in harmony, it’s incredibly easy to miscalculate by a small amount in the beginning, and wind up with a huge discrepancy by the end that forces you to start over, damage your cabinets, or worse, compromise the integrity of your walls. After all, cabinets need to support a lot of weight – their own, as well as everything stored inside.

As for the materials themselves, the quality of the wood is going to be your biggest determining factor when it comes to the long-term aesthetic and durability of your cabinets. The strongest cabinets have a plywood infrastructure that is often even stronger than solid wood – this is because it’s made of thinner layers of wood running both length- and width-wise which reinforces itself to bear much more weight. By contrast, particleboard – another common cabinet material – is made of compressed wood and much more susceptible to deterioration over time. If you’ve ever seen sagging shelving inside cabinets, that’s a very common sign they are made of fatiguing particleboard.

Although plywood will likely compose the internal structure of your cabinet, solid wood is par for the course when it comes to the cabinet doors and drawer faces of your kitchen’s cabinet set. That being said, some kitchens call for a bit more drama and you may want to consider an alternative cabinet material such as metal or glass, both of which are sure to last and prove themselves well worth the investment.

Finally, although the aesthetics of your cabinets are surely the exciting parts – the devil is truly in the details and it’s important those are also well-constructed so your cabinets work as wonderfully as they look. Ensure you understand the difference between high and low quality hinges, which can become loose or damage your frame. Also be sure to invest in drawer glides that won’t break your drawers while they are filled with your belongings and ruin your cabinets, your items, and potentially your floors. Finally, consider all the other details such as interior coatings and a non-porous surface that will last without absorbing the contents of your cabinets, I-beams that provide long-term reinforcement (as opposed to gussets or braces), and any other things that may be important to you.

Above all else – ask questions! You should feel confident in your cabinets – after all, they are an investment. If there is anything you would like to understand further, keep pressing until you feel you have all the information you need to make the best possible decision to build your best possible kitchen!