This is how all islands are basically created, so not to worry. If you think about what a cabinet looks like, it's a box. If you have two boxes, you need to secure them together. Make sure that your floor is level, or you have a way to shim the bottoms and secure them as well.

If you don't want to secure them to the floor, secure the cabinets to each other, and have the counter be a single piece. The trick is to purchase a cabinet that has sides or backs that can be finished.

Good luck

I have had a dining room buffet that was 18" by 48" with drawers in it and it was not attached to the floor with cleats. I am not sure why 24x48 needs to be attached to the floor for safety if it is constructed right.

I will agree with live_wire_oak on talking to the municipality about code.

Thanks! Yes, the primary reason we are not bolting it is that our permits are finaled and we are not interested in reopening them for love or money (and we don't want to add something without permits, as that can be a resale issue here). The secondary, but also significant, reasons are that we have a floating floor with wood below and don't want to damage either, and we don't want or have budget for electrical in it. The original plan called for a work table in this space, but we are finding that open storage at that level is not working well with a toddler. The backup plan is still to get a work table with shelves, though, and it may be that this is wiser. I'm trying to see if I can design something that would work with closed cabinets before giving up, though! (We have looked for a freestanding table with closed storage for a couple of years with no success, sadly.) We don't need to be able to move it, though, which helps. Hoping to do a wood top, but not sure if this will work with the weight.

If we build it from cabinets, we would do IKEA with doors from Scherr's or Semihandmade, so the idea was to do panels on the back and sides, which I think would work but is of course costly--still trying to figure out if there's a better way to handle that. In that case, we could to a toekick or could just add some legs.

I'm not sure I understand sitting on the island, though--do you mean getting up on it and physically sitting on top of it? Or just pulling up a chair? The latter seems fine but the former seems bizarre--hopefully we could manage that by asking people not to do this! It hadn't occurred to me, though.

The dimensions assume an additional 1.5" overhang on each side between panels and counter, which leaves us with workable aisles (we've been testing with a temporary table for a couple of years) so covered on that front!

Islands seem to be magnets for toddlers to use to pull themselves up. That changes the center of gravity on a free standing object. They also seem to be magnets for younger kids and teens to vault their hineys up and sit on. I'm in the middle of building out a kitchen showroom, and I have an island that doesn't even have a top to it in the middle of an unfinished cabinet installation, and lo and behold, I looked out from my office to see a bored 8 year old boy sitting on the top of it, totally absorbed in some electronic gadget that his inattentive parent had supplied him to keep him quiet while he browsed for flooring. There was a guest table and chairs supplied, but the kid sat on top of the island. That's not the first time I've observed that happening, and I've actually been in a kitchen where a drunken college student tipped a small island/cart over by trying to sit on it. That was a LONG time ago, but I'll never forget the dent in the apartment floor that my girlfriend had to try to disguise. And the bruises on her boyfriend were impressive.

Just saying that a 30 pound kid can quickly grow into a 200 football player and that horseplay can be dampened down, but never eliminated. So, plan for the worst. And try to smack them enough that only the best behavior happens. (And then their rowdy friends visit.)

If I were going to do this, I would build a base to replace the hollow bottom of the cabinet where the toe kick would be. I would make it the same size or larger than the top. To make it even more stable, I would add as much weight as I could in the base. If you made a 27x51" 2x4 frame and filled it with 2x4' pieces of OSB, you would gain about 80 lbs to the bottom. The problem with this is that you lose a toe kick area, which may or may not be important. One could easily take in the frame a couple inches where you think you will spend the majority of your time, but I would definitely leave at least the corners framed out full depth. If you'd like to add trim to decorate the base, you'll need to make the frame a bit smaller to accommodate the depth of the trim. I'll add a quick (not exact measurements) picture, in case I'm not wording this well.

Thanks! @live_wire_oak, ack--that's daunting! It sounds like we might just be trading one problem for another! The backup plan is a Boos worktable, which I like the looks of a lot, but which makes the pots very accessible to small hands--we've had our ceramic bowls sitting on the counter for months so that they won't be within reach on the kitchen cart that's currently there. But maybe I should just stick it out for this stage and keep to the worktable plan for the long haul? Or maybe there are some creative short-term childproofing options...

@mrsmortarmixer, we could definitely play with something like that--90% of the time the island will be used from two of the four sides (facing the sink and stove) so the other two sides could also help to stabilize. The main challenge is for us to stay within our DIY abilities as far as framing and such, since we're in an expensive labor market so once we get to the point of needing help, the cost balloons (and then we're back to just sticking with the work table if we can't do this for a modest amount). But I'll play with the idea and see what might work--thanks!

I have a friend who has a floating floor and I believe she was told by the floor manufacturer to leave 1/4 inch space between base cabinets and floor. No floating floor under the base cabinets because the weight of cabinets + stuff in cabs + granite could cause the floor to bind. I think she did the same for the island- the floor was cut out for the island and then the island was anchored to the subfloor.

We have 6 kids, youngest are 2 yr old twins and they climb. Their current trick is to open the cab doors until the child lock catches (about 2 inches, maybe and they manage to get a few toes into that space so they can see what is up on the counter or to reach for some forbidden thing up there. I spend my day running from one to the other to keep them out of trouble (they strategize).

My older kids know no sitting on counters but once or twice, one of their friends will sit on one, especially the 7-12 yr old kids. They are told to get down and they do but some parents allow it so when they come over they think it is ok initially.

I think I'd search for a work type table if you can't anchor it. Toddlers and kids can come up with crazy things to try and I just wouldn't trust a non anchored island.

A worktable with open bottom shelf on which you place some concrete blocks for the toddler years might work the best. Then you can shift and store your cast iron collection there.

Oy. It sounds like I have bigger problems coming my way than my 15-month-old trying to pull ceramic bowls down...

Okay. I'm thinking we should abandon this, given the many potential pitfalls, and just get the work table and figure out some alternate storage until we can use the work table shelves fully. *sigh* ...so how many years do you figure that is? ;) Thanks all!

My island is not attached to the floor. I have electrical in it. It is 3x6 on the higher side and 4x5 on the table-height side. It does have about 600 lbs. of marble sitting on top of it. It's not moving anywhere!

We made our island from stock cabinets (24X60) to save $$. We watched a demonstration on youtube and I can tell you honestly, we are not seasoned DIYers. The back and sides are wrapped in bead board & trim, and we painted the whole thing. It has an Ash wood top. The island incorporates 3 cabinets with the middle section as a bank of drawers, one end for recycling bins and the other for cutting boards. It doesn't really have much in the way of heavy stuff in it, but it stays put, even without being bolted down. And I too, have a precocious little person; she was given her own special drawer so she would leave mine alone. Worked like a charm :) Good luck to you!

We made our island from stock cabinets (24X60) to save $$. We watched a demonstration on youtube and I can tell you honestly, we are not seasoned DIYers. The back and sides are wrapped in bead board & trim, and we painted the whole thing. It has an Ash wood top. The island incorporates 3 cabinets with the middle section as a bank of drawers, one end for recycling bins and the other for cutting boards. It doesn't really have much in the way of heavy stuff in it, but it stays put, even without being bolted down. And I too, have a precocious little person; she was given her own special drawer so she would leave mine alone. Worked like a charm :) Good luck to you!

Can you just work with one of Ikea's freestanding cabinets? I have one (from a discontinued line but similar to Varde) that went from baking center to art supply chest and it's sturdy. If you put some non-melamine drawer fronts on it, it would look respectable. Mine is 52" wide with 3 drawers and at its fullest, it could have all drawers full (flours, sugars, canning supplies) and open and not the slightest bit tipsy. Same with paper, now that I think of it.

And those beautiful beautiful drawers.

Sadly, IKEA has discontinued their freestanding cabinets, or that would have worked well. They only have one version left, and it's too long and only available mail order for exorbitant shipping charges (which is doubly frustrating give that we live a whopping two miles from the store!) I have a Craigslist watch on for one, but no dice so far. In fact, not only was this line discontinued, but the pieces we planned to use when we finished our kitchen in Fall 2011, a butcher block top and a stainless steel shelf base, were also discontinued. The base *and* the butcher block (which were from two unrelated lines). I mean, I know they cycle through things, but I've never had every single thing I was looking at dropped in one fell swoop...that was why we reopened the idea of building our own, figuring maybe it was karma. Maybe not... :)

This post was edited by artemis78 on Mon, Jan 28, 13 at 22:48

Really? But! They still have them on their website!

We did have to special order ours a few years ago but picked it up at their warehouse which was...I don't recall. Hayward? But it was free.

They do---but try setting the stock check for any store in California, and they're no longer sold... :( I could try calling to see if I can order it and have it sent to the store or warehouse for free, though--hadn't thought to ask. The website shipping is $99, which adds a lot. (I figured out that it was discontinued only when I went to the store to buy it over the holidays and the entire display was gone!)

This post was edited by artemis78 on Mon, Jan 28, 13 at 23:51