Any rules about drawer pulls?

16 years ago

I am planning on several drawer stacks with some deep drawers. Some are 21" or 24".

Is there a rule of thumb about drawer pulls? For example, drawers that are 18" or larger should have 2 pulls to help distribute the potential weight when opened. Or is 1 good enough - just get what you like.

Thanks for your help!

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Comments (6)

susan4664
16 years ago
On the advice of my cabinet maker, I used a single 3" pull on my smaller silverware drawers, and the matching 5" pull on the larger pots and pan drawers. I didn't want to have to use two hands when opening the large drawers to grab things. It works well for me.
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Buehl
16 years ago
Some people say you should have 2 pulls on drawers wider than 27" or 30" b/c using two hands keeps the drawers from twisting (or whatever it's called!). Others say one pull on all b/c many times you only have one hand free and end up opening the drawer with one hand and you want the handle centered on the drawer for even force on both glides.

However, if you have good/heavy duty drawer glides, then I don't think it matters...so I would go w/what you like aesthetically.

Personally, I like the look of two pulls on the longer drawers...but many others like the look of one. If you're wondering what you would like, check out the Finished Kitchens Blog. Unfortunately, there's no category for "number of pulls on drawers," but hopefully if you check out several kitchens you'll find at least one of each!

HTH!
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My experience with using 2 pulls on a wide drawer has not been good. So for this kitchen I will only be using 1 pull per drawer. When you have 2 pulls on a drawer, it takes two hands and often you already have something in one hand. Or, if you just use one of the 2 pulls to open the drawer, it creates stress to the drawer on one side, and also the pull will loosen over time from being asked to pull the entire drawer open from one side. As a result, I am using 1 pull for my drawers. I am using different sizes. Just my taste, but I don't like all one pull size for the entire kitchen. I have read about the 1/3 rule, and the pulls I am choosing, the Top Knobs Princetonians, have many sizes. When deciding between two sizes that both fit roughly the 1/3 rule, I get the smaller one. The wider pulls are expensive, but as a percentage of the cost of my entire reno which is multi-thousands, I am spending about $450 for my pulls. The majority of mine are the 11-11/32" size which are about $13 each. I am getting 4 different sizes in all (includes 2 pulls that are 15" long hung vertically for pull-out pantries). I don't think it's that bad to spend a couple hundred more to get the size that looks good. The pulls really make a difference to how the entire kitchen looks.
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abbycat9990
16 years ago
We have 24", 33" and 36" drawer stacks, and used the same 13" handle on all of them. Here's the 33" drawer stack:
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mygar
Original Author
16 years ago
Thanks everybody. I think my biggest stack is 24" so even if I used that rule, it wouldn't matter, and I really don't want to have to use 2 hands either.

Abby, I like your long pulls.

I thought I was about finished with all the decisions but I forgot about hardware so I still have more to go.
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raehelen
16 years ago
Yup, 24" is considered a 'smaller' drawer! :>)

No problem with one pull.

I love my 24" drawers! Don't have the 36" ones yet, but so far the 24" size is my favorite!
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paul_ma
16 years ago
I just received my pulls, but they aren't installed yet. They are bar pulls.

After a lot of thought and doing a mock up, I decided to use pulls slightly shorter than the panel in the drawers. (Shaker cabinets with paneled drawer fronts.)

For doors I am using the same kind of pulls, vertically. For upper doors they start at the bottom of the door and run up, while on bottom doors they start at the top and run down. I settled on 10" ones for almost all the doors, except for the bottom doors on the pantries. For those I am using 28" pulls, so that there is pull where your hand is.

I'll post a picture once they are installed. But it may not be for a week or two. I'm now in the wrap up stage, and waiting for a variety of things.
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Any rules about drawer pulls?

Comments (6)

susan4664

Buehl

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Any rules about drawer pulls?

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