unfortunately there are endless possibilities in design. it's unrealistic to think any one person could (or should) present every imaginable option. when you enlist another person to assist you in such an important undertaking i think it's vital to remember it's your space and it is assumed that you will have ideas and expectations for it's transformation. for instance, right now i am researching insulation. i have a GC but i need to know what my options are in order to make an educated choice and be satisfied with the end result.
i've said it here before and without intending to be rude i have to say it again: designers and contractors are not mind readers. look around, see what you like and ask for ideas and visual looks that you like to be implemented in the design! good luck.

I prefer one fake door. The other option looks like a stage set thing, but that's only my opinion.

One thing I have emphasized is I want it to be hidden. I would have picked the two door option immediately if given the choice because I want the stage set look. Now I feel sad I didn't get the choice to make the kitchen more like how I want it. Can I do anything about it?

My KD and I did discuss this, but as time passed we simply forgot to order it this way when the time came. I have the one panel and wish I had the drawer and door look as the majority of my kitchen is drawers. I suppose you could order another door and pay additional for it.

Whenever I brought the design of the dishwasher panels up, KD said "we can't discuss it until the dishwasher is bought." KD refused to discuss it several times.

did you sign off on design before the order was put through?

I agree that no KD or GC or whatever is going to present every single option to every single customer. Not only is that not practical, but the vast majority of people don't want all those choices. If you are one of those people (I'm one) who wants to know every single option before making a decision, then it's up to you to ask and research. If you had asked to see available panel before ordering, and the KD hadn't shown you this one, she would have been at fault.

Most people who hire a designer/decorator, whether it's for the kitchen or any other room, want that person to do the legwork then present them with the best option or maybe a couple of choices. The idea being that the reason they hired the designer in the first place was to make those judgements.

I'm not like that. I don't want anyone else making those choices for me. So, I did all the research BEFORE talking to the KD & GC. Then I was able to say, here's exactly what I want.

When I did this, it was clear I was in the minority. I had so many KDs, GCs and salespeople act surprised at how much I knew, how much I'd already planned and how much I'd picked out. Most people just hand over the keys, very few of us want to do the driving.

So it's not at all surprising that unless it's made clear from the beginning that you want to be fully educated about everything, you'll either get just a couple of choices, or the "most popular" option will just get picked for you.

At this point, I would talk to the KD and ask what the cost and procedure would be to exchange. Can't hurt to ask!

It's a bit of chicken and egg syndrome. You can't design the door panel until you know which DW the client is using, and which DW the client uses can limit the style of panel the client can have.

If you are someone who really is into the minute details of the kitchen, you need to communicate that to the KD on the front end. And you need to do your research in advance to know what you like and what you want. YOu can't have it both ways. You can't be detail oriented without an idea of the details that you want. To expect someone else to educate you on the 50 options that exist in the brands and possible panel configurations is unrealistic. YOu have to be proactive on your own education and ideas.

Depends on the cab company too. My KD was an employee of the cab company and they don't make a two door option, in fact, when I asked for it, she made me feel like I was some sort of lunatic for even dreaming up such an idea. Against her better judgement (there's no way it will hold, it won't fit, etc) I ordered a drawer front and cab door and secured them together with metal braces. We've had it for about 3 years and it's been fine.

While you need a dishwasher to order a door panels because of the size, you can ask your KD to price that in and order it later when you have a DW.
Since our DW does not 'technically' accept a panel (we have a DIY fix), we ordered a drawer slab & 2 door slabs and will mount ourselves, and it will look like all of the other base cabinets (we have a small kitchen and no drawer base, all rollout shelves with top drawer).
The DW determines the overall size of the drawer & door slabs.
Good luck!

Kitchen designer is looking at Bosch specs now to see if it can even be done with Bosch dishwasher. (Cabinet company can make the doors, just a matter of how to mount it.)

Of course it can be done with a Bosch. I did it. It takes special fabrication to cover the seam between the "drawer" and the "door" parts. It's do-able with a little ingenuity.
Casey

Sombreuil_mongrel, can you tell me how you did it? Kitchen designer started off "it can't be done" before I convinced kitchen designer to look at specs and see if it can be done.

We used a drawer front, a door front, and some matching stock to create a solid piece. Part of the drawer back and door back were routed to insert matching stock to make join them into a solid piece,so technically the reveal is correct but the false "face frame" of the cabinet sits slightly proud of where the real face frame is...unnoticeably so.

I have even see the DW front set up as all drawers. It can be done, it just takes some custom work.

Palimpsest, I actually don't understand what you said. Can you dumb it down for me??

The kitchen designer tried to get me to believe the rim would be visible but when I asked if the kitchen designer had looked at the specs the answer was "no".

I have a Miele DW so the panel mounts on a mounting bracket, there is no rim around the door and drawer front.

Could you post a picture of the spec's of your DW?

Basically they took the door and drawer front. Cut a notch out of the back of the drawer front along the bottom back edge, and cut a notch out of the door along the top back edge and then joined the two together with a piece of wood with a bit of space between to align with that on the other cabinets. (This space in between is why the material had to match the cabinets--you can see the piece used to join the door and drawer front.)

Contractor will look at actual dishwasher today and see if it is true that we can't have fake drawer because of rim showing.

{{!gwi}}

I am thinking the panel may have been ordered wrong in the first place because the rim comment doesn't make sense. I don't think rim could be showing for a fake drawer and not for one fake door.

Hi,
I started with the door panel sized the same height as a regular door that would have a drawer above. I started with a wider drawer slab. I created a 1/4" thick, 3/4" wide tongue on the back edge of the drawer slab. The door then got a dado routed in the back edge to receive the tongue. I left the corners of the dado in wood, so the end grain of the tongue would be hidden, because I'm a perfectionist. The ends of the tingue were rounded over to fit the rounded dado. This worked really well because I did all my own finishing (as well as assembly (unassembled cabinets) so there were no issues and the fabrication was all done before any finish went on. This may be a little more problematical with pre-finished, but instead of forming the tongue from the drawer front itself, it could alsomst as easily be a separate piece, and you'd heve your guys cu the dado slot on both the drawer and the door, and the tongue would be milled from a segment of filler strip, or what have you.

Casey

Good news (sort of): Kitchen designer ordered cabinets the wrong size for a tall tub instead of short tub according to contractor. (So maybe I can get my drawer.)

Bad news. Contractor says can't put drawer because there is no backer panel on the Bosch and cabinets are partial overlay so you would see dishwasher. (I'm going to be crushed if I can't get my drawer.)

Thanks for posting all that, Casey. I am going to show it the contractor and see if changes anything and if I can still get the drawer somehow.

Really good news! Based upon Casey's pictures, contractor says that we can get the fake drawer and door that go as wide as the dishwasher, then use a thin strip of painted wood we already have for between the fake drawer and door, and at the bottom a thin strip as well. Then we just have to paint the unfinished edges of the wood white, which won't be seen except when you open the door.

Wow, that was really a big help, Casey. Thanks!!!

That's great news. I'm glad that the sleepless nights I spend figuring out little details weren't wasted on just my stupid kitchen, but yours as well.
I worded that well, huh?
Casey

Oh, yeah, Casey...I am so happy you wrote about it. Also happy I posted now. I really got help from this board.

I went round and round with my cabinetmaker. I didn't want a door that looked like full overlay because then what is the point of a paneled DW. This is a Miele DW with partial overlay drawer and door. They built it as a face frame and mounted the drawer and doors.

I have a drawer on mine - preferable to me. My KD just did it that way. However I did receive detailed drawings of my kitchen and if it had not been this way in the drawings I would have changed it. Mine is partial overlay with a Miele Incognito.

{{!gwi}}

How are yours mounted? Bosch doesn't have a rim or backer so Miele should be mounted differently.

Miele with real partial overlay is better than jerry-rigging pieces of leftover wood in and painting unfinished edges on a Bosch. I wish I had bought Miele now.

I just hope that the jerry-rigging will look decent.

The Miele has a metal rails that screw into the back of the panel and slip over clips on the front of the DW.

Gibby's DW pics made all the difference in getting my KD to agree to try. The insisted that I agree to pay for a new panel 'the right way' if what I wanted didn't work before they would make the one you see in the pic. Of course it worked.

I am going to have to look and see if the Bosch does that too.

Well found out the dimensions we gave them to do it like Casey can't be done. But if we use regular 24" door and drawer mounted onto some type of backing, that can be done.

So how were yours mounted and what backer did you use? Was it a 3/4 inch backer or a really thin backer?

I don't know how to take the panel off the DW, but I think it is a full size frame. The Miele DW can be pushed back, which makes it work. Be sure of the measurements. The frame on the Miele is 23 1/2'' wide and the drawer and door are 21'' wide.

The measurements are similar to mine.

We just need to figure out if we need a thick backer (with white paint on sides) or a thin backer (which has unfinished sides). And how to mount. Installation instructions are useless since they are for full overlay only.

Cotehele, can you tell me the measurement of your gap from top of backer to countertop and the measurement from top to bottom of your backer panel (not to the floor)? I need to reorder the right size.

Designer claims there is no error and wants me to pay twice. However from bottom of cabinets to countertop is 30" and designer ordered one that is over 30" (it would go below the cabinets even if there is no little gap.