Yes - I did it, as many on this forum recommended. The only base cabinets I have are sink bases and one 12" w x 12" d cabinet that acts as a support for my island. I love them. No bending over to peer into the black hole. No opening doors and then having to pull out a pullout. I used 3 drawer stacks every where. My favorite is the 36" drawers under my cooktop for pots.

I would suggest you look around and see what items you have that might not fit in a drawer. Can they be laid on their side? How often do you use them? Can you store them under the sink or elsewhere nearby? That may help you to decide if you need at least one regular cabinet.

There have been many threads over the years discussing drawers in base cabinets vs roll out tray shelves (ROTS) and stationary shelves. Drawers win!

All drawers is one of the most common and consistent recommendations hare.

Make sure they're all "full-extension", meaning they pull all the way out from the cabinet. Soft-close is also nice, but not a "must". If you're going with Ikea, you will be getting both with some of the best hardware out there...Blumotion.

In my case, all but one of my base cabinets, excluding sink bases, are either drawer bases or pullouts. I only have one with ROTS and I regret it...I wish it were a pullout similar to a trash pullout. I absolutely do not regret going "all drawers"!

I have:

Drawer bases, 3 drawers: 24", 27", 30" (with a WD in the middle), 31" (w/a MW drawer in the top), 33", 36" under my cooktop.

Drawer base, 4 drawers: 24"

Trash pullout: 18"

Filler Pullouts: 6", two of them (flanking my cooktop)

Even my tall oven cabinet (31.5") has a drawer in the bottom.

My sole ROTS cabinet is 27" and is our "Pet Center"...dog food & treats on the bottom ROTS, leashes, collars, etc. on the top ROTS, batteries & flashlights in the top drawer. This is the cabinet I wish were a pullout like the trash pullout...drawer on top, door attached to a bottom shelf that pulls out plus an ROTS on the inside.

Note: In many cases people refer to ROTS as "pullout shelves". These are not the same as pullouts such as trash pullouts or full-cabinet height pullouts (like filler pullouts, pantry pullouts, etc.)

2009 Thread: Kitchen drawers versus pull-out shelves?

2010 Thread: Drawers over pull outs in Cabinets

2010 Thread: Drawers or cabinet under cooktop?

2010 Thread: Which pull out drawers are must haves?

i did drawers under the sink too.

Buehl, I was rereading most of my previous threads. The more I looked at your kitchen (which is beautiful!), your layout that you showed where your stove was, looked similiar to one of my ideas. Where is your frig and main sink? Better yet, can you post your complete layout?

I reread some of the threads "if you're new to GW". If we get new cabinets, were going to go with drawers for most of the base cabinets, now that I fully understand the why behind it. Also we checked out one of those pull out trash cabinets. Now I understand your insistence on them. No matter old or new cabinets....this is a must!

All drawers except for under sink and one 18" cupboard that I thought I should have just in case. My KD tried to talk me out of it but I insisted. She was right and I will never go back to cupboards. The drawers are probably the biggest surprise in so far as how much of a difference they make in the functioning of a kitchen.

We have all drawers except the sink base and two pull-outs with interior pull-out shallow drawers. I LOVE the drawers -- wouldn't trade them for the world. We opted for two pull-outs so that the Kitchen-Aid mixer would have a home. It is too tall for a drawer. It also allows room for pet food containers.

If you're using Ikea, you can do the full-height pull-out like we did, and then you can put the interior drawer(s) at whatever height works for you.

The pull-outs are on the end:

Drawers all over here, too. I love 'em. They really make the lowers much more functional. My larger drawers are 36 inches for dishes and 40 inches for pots. I put a pull out trash next to the cleanup sink and a smaller pullout trash under the prep sink. The only "standard" cabinets I have are under the sinks. I have no regrets, and do not miss having standard lowers at all. I'd do it again without hesitation.
Cj

My sink base, which does have two doors, has a ROTS in the bottom. My pantries, which have doors, have ROTS in the lowers (I do like that better than drawers for pantry storage because I'm always getting things from different shelves, and I think I got an extra one in by not having drawers as well). I even have ROTS in a couple of lower drawers. I have two lower door cupboards in the butler's pantry: one has horizontal tray storage, and the other has vertical platter storage. The only non-fitted cabinet is under the prep sink. It's tiny and holds the fire extinguisher. And there are lots of drawers!

Regrets? Not a one. I had all doors with stationery shelves in the old kitchen. Hated it!!

I sure wish more people would think outside the box when it comes to lower cabinets!

We are doing some work here in the Office I work in. They just put in a 15' wall of base cabinets for storage and such. First thing - the secertay wants them to install pull out trays as it's too hard to get down and get stored office supplies out of those cabients.

No one thought to ask about doors/drawers when they ordered the cabinets, but I think a row of drawers would have been so much more useful in an office environment.

My bases are all either shallow (13" on one side of the island) or drawers other than 2 sink bases and one trash pullout. The pet food goes under the prep sink and the KA stays out on the counter (but it could fit in a 13" deep base turned sideways). No regrets, but I do have a tall cabinet above my fridge for the super sized stock pot and canning pot. Take an inventory of what you need to put in you cabinets and make sure you have places for everything. Some folks need one or two deep bases. Others don't.

Thanks for the replies! I will be getting all drawers and one full size pull out for the trash. I'm excited! Only one more day til we go buy them, then I get the pleasure of demoing the current cabinets. Ahhhh, demo therapy.

I did more than I had in my previous kitchen, but still wish I had done more. I'm still struggling to find a good place to put my frying pans. Two large drawers in my island would have been the perfect solution. Oh well, maybe next time around.

Totally Confused

I got my 80-yr-old Mum in the UK to get all drawers when she put in new base cabs on one side of the kitchen, and she loves them. When we get new base cabs later this year for the side of our kitchen that doesn't have any, they will be all drawers.

OMG Jakabedy, those photos just solved a big problem for me! I'm going to have my cabinet maker make another pullout for the top part of the trash drawer, for compost.

THANK YOU!

BTW a large overhang doesn't interfere with my shallow top drawers. They are full extension drawers. An extra inch or 1.5" beyond the "standard" overhang is not an obstacle. This is f.y.i.

Just remember that with all drawers you have to make sure everything goes back into the proper drawer or else you will end up pulling out one drawer, closing and then re-opening another until you find what you need. Everybody that uses the kitchen will have to be schooled in the "A place for everything and everything in it's place" mentality or you will get very tired of all that drawer opening and closing.

In our kitchen we actually made a design choice that eliminated one spot where we were going to put drawers for pots and pan storage. We have a small space and it was one thing or the other and our priority was the other. For some storage I prefer a tall cabinet with ROTS. makes it easy to open one door....much lighter than a fully loaded drawer...and then I can scan all the trays quickly for what I need. A better solution for some items.

jakabedy...that's what I originally wanted for our "Pet Center" but when we finalized our kitchen order I forgot to to check to be sure that's what I got and, unfortunately, did not get. It was never "in writing" so I didn't have a case to make the KD reorder the cabinet at her cost. If it weren't for the fact that it has two doors, I could retrofit it. One day I may order a door to replace the two and then redo it, but not right now.

Aloha2009...Thank you! I really love it...not too fussy and not too plain/minimalist...just right! I've linked my photo album below. Meanwhile, here are a couple of shots of the kitchen as a whole.

Looking toward the DR from the FR:

Looking toward the FR from the DR:

Here is a link that might be useful: Buehl's Kitchen Album

I got a mix of drawers and rollouts, depending on what goes in them. I like having the different adjustable heights of the rollouts with the low sides, especially with a single door on each side of the cooktop. I have deep 36" wide drawers under the cooktop. We have some other specialty cabinets, and a 27" cab with rollouts for snacks.

For our needs, I found two banks of 4 drawers each under the peninsula (sink in the middle, recycling & DW on each side of it, drawers on each side of these) works much better than the deeper drawers.

In our lower level galley kitchen, there are two 27" cabs with rollouts on each side of the range. The double doors don't bother me, like they seem to bother others--I'm just happy with the adjustable ROs. I was unsure how this kitchen would be used (my mother was supposed to live down there during the summers, but instead my daughter is), and put in one bank of 4 drawers and another with 3 drawers. The 3 drawers are useless here--she just puts paper bags in the 2 deep ones.

Both kitchens have a walk in pantry.

It's very helpful to make a list of everything that you want to keep in the kitchen, and then figure out what size drawer/rollout would work best.

Anne

Just wanted to say thanks to the replies I missed, and all of the opinions here helped me decide for sure that drawers are the way to go. I ended up buying only one non-drawer cabinet and that was a trash pull out.

I'm so happy, can't wait to have them installed next week!

We have IKEA cabs, and I promise you will LOVE having the drawers! I love, love, love all my drawers--and I have a kitchen full of them!

Even the heaviest of my drawers opens easily and closes softly. *sigh* How did I go so long without them? ;^)

I'm so glad I ended up going with Ikea.
I was able to get so much more for my money that I would have gotten elsewhere and I really like the style. I went with the Adel.

The soft close is a very nice feature, I was opening and closing drawers the entire time I was there, lol!

I also picked up a pull out faucet...they got me. I couldn't resist.

I have a bunch of boxes everywhere now, but this time next week it will be a fully functional kitchen!

Yes, drawers everywhere except the two corners where I have the IKEA susans. My small applicances live on the susans (toaster, cuisinart, juicer, etc.) since they are used infrequently. All my pyrex in one 36" drawer, pots and pans in another. It is a great system.