We are in the midst of working on a similar project for our home office. I've been working with a few of the closet companies that specialize in built-ins for closets, garages and home office. They are a comprehensive solution that does the cabinets, counters, wire management, etc. However, they are not fully custom--more modular with cabinets in different sizes though these can be modified. I am asking for one custom cabinet to be notched back on one side which is proving to be a challenge. These are usually made from a high grade melamine, though some have wood upgrade option.

Many offer a free consultation and design service which can be helpful.

We are actually thinking of having CA Closets do our project. They work through Costco and if purchased through Costco we will receive a $100 Costco gift card per $1,000 spent plus as it is purchased through Costco, eligible for any additional end of year rebates.

sarschlos_remodeler used Closet World a few years ago for her home office and has shared pictures so perhaps she'll post here. I will add she was VERY dissatisfied--both with the product and installation.

We recently converted a formal living room into a home office/library by installing an 11.5-foot wall of cabinets. We used Kraftmaid cabinets from Lowe's. These aren't custom built cabinets, but we didn't need any odd configurations. We used 2 sets of lateral file drawers and 4 sets of shelves behind doors on the bottom. We have 4 glass-door cabinets on top with one, larger, open bookcase on top.

I was very pleased with our designer at Lowe's. We told him what we wanted/needed and described the style of the room. He came up with a plan that was even better than my original idea.

The installers were very good too. They had to work around a window casing and floor vent.

So far, we are very pleased. Hopefully the rest of the furniture will arrive soon. I'm so ready to have ONE room completed!

Nin

Here is a photo of the built-in office through Closet World, which we had installed in our previous house. Gads, that company is just AWFUL. It (finally) looked right-ish (just don't look too closely) after I threatened to file formal complaints with the Civil Division of the County District Attorney's office for fraud and breach of contract and a formal complaint with the State Contractor's Licensing Board. I found out later that this was a company that an aquaintance of mine had actually sued because of their shoddy work on his closets. Closet World has many different aliases, so be sure to google them to find out who they really are.

Of all the "organizer" companies, the only one I have heard consistently good things about is California Closets.

The organization of our office was pretty good, except that the bookcase was built too deep and all my books kept sliding to the back -- I hate that. We had the following units in ours: floor-to-ceiling bookcase with glass doors; a 30" drawer base with a shallow top drawer and two cd/dvd drawers; a 21" cabinet with a drawer and a pullout for our shredder and garbage (my design); open space for two corner desks, and open space except for a support thingy in the middle, then a 30" drawer base with a shallow drawer, a medium-sized drawer and a double lateral file drawer. We had a second, separate desk with a pencil drawer and two double lateral file drawers. On the one full wall of our office (it's in an open loft), we had two solid door-cabinets and an open bookcase space. We did the open space for two reasons: One, they wrapped the bookcase around our air vent, and two for visual interest.

Anyway, here is a picture. Our table tops were formica so that they would be resistent to the heat generated by the computers and would not be damaged by ink, cutting, etc.

Earlier this year we had (custom) cabinets made and installed in what we call the den (aka study / home office). The room is still not yet unpacked because my two year-old likes to "help," so I do piecemeal when he's napping. Hopefully by the new year it'll be functional. Ha ha! Not saying which new year ....

The home office is for me because I am the one who pays bills / organizes / manages our family's life. I also do calligraphy and envision doing it there. My children are little but I can only imagine that as they grow they'll have more projects / paperwork, and now we have one room dedicated to just that! We have a lot of cabinetry in there (it's practically a kitchen!) and the (high-end) custom cabinetry alone (not inc. installation) was about $10,500. (I'm in Colorado.)

I looked at some stock and semi-custom lines and those gave me less for more, meaning for a similar set-up (but not perfect) the quote was between $13,000 and $14,000 (for KraftMaid at HD); StarMark was a little more than $14,000 and UltraCraft was ~$11,000.

This is the "computer" wall (the cpus, printer, scanner / copier, modems, etc. are contained in the big cupboard on the left -- it has pull-out shelves and channels for wires); it's about thirteen feet long:

We have two work stations (one is currently holding a portable radiator, the other a box), again with a channel under the desktop (which was included in the price -- I love it!) to hold wires for monitors, phone, etc. The long drawers under the computer cupboard is file storage, and each work station has its own bank of three drawers.

This is the bookcase / sofa wall, a little less than thirteen feet:

Our GC said he could've built the bookcases for us (propping them atop the drawer banks which are kinda obscured by the boxes ...), but it was actually less expensive for us to have the cabinetmaker make them.

Over in the Kitchens Forum buehl did her kitchen through Expo and she has some v. unsavory stories about that experience. I don't know if it was just her space or just her Expo or what; we don't have an Expo in CO so it was never an option for me, but her stories scared me.

Anyway, to me the money we spent in the den was a lot of money -- don't get me wrong -- but I absolutely believe we will reap its rewards for years and years to come, both in terms of utility and also my sanity (in not going crazy about having important papers scattered all over which drives me bananas).

Of course, it all depends on your space, cab. style, etc. but my quote for CA Closets is coming in around $8,000 for everything (cab, laminate counters, wire mgmt, and installation) with a $800 credit back to Costco. This is for 8 cabs., one with glass and all counters (which will require templating, more cutting, notching due to bay popout). Closet World was around $3,000 though a lot of the features were missing in the design including the templating charge; but I'm not working with them anymore. Neither of the other two closet companies we worked with could do a computerized design which I feel is key for my space, though I've been very impressed with CA closets who has provided my with a CAD design including elevations.

Still, we see this as a more economical alternative, but I'd say the quality is less than what you will find with a kitchen cabinet type manufacturer. Melamine and real wood/veneers just are not in the same category; at the same time coming as this is on the tail end of a remodel, we've already probably overdeveloped our property for the neighborhood so putting too much more $$ in this house which we could not recoup should we be in a situation that we needed to sell does not make sense either.

I have an appt. set up with Lowe's for tomorrow and plan to have them quote out the design in Kraftmaid/laminate counters and am very curious what the price difference will be. I have this one corner of my office where there is a step and I want an angled cabinet and they just cannot make anything for it nor do they have the setup to do the mitered cuts needed to modify an existing cabinet.

My VERY small 'office' will be the closet in the game room. The closet is bigger than average, but by no means a walk-in closet!

It will really only hold my computer, as I don't need a closet since I don't work from home, or even work. LOL I'm happily retired! And yes, it's all been wired for computer/phone/extra outlets, and a ceiling fixture.

It's 10' tall, with lots of shelves, and i'm thinking of wallpapering the wall with the shelves in wallpaper or border that looks like a row of books. I haven't decided if i'll take the door off or leave it on. It may depend on the size of the chair.

Anyway, this will be my 'built in closet office', and quite cozy! ;o)

Thank you everyone. I am not looking at California Closet type finish for my study since it's going to be more formal. Rmkitchen, my study vision is very similar to yours. I am also looking at white cabinets with a crown moulding finishing touch on the top. The quote I got was around 20K and my room is not as large as yours.

I wanted to ask you if Home Depot did a turn key operation for you or did you have to measure and order stuff. Your finish looks very nice and I am curious if they came home, measured and did a turn key operation. Thanks again for your help.

Check out small local custom cabinetmakers. We're currently planning a large built-in entertainment center for our family room that's 13 ft long and 10 foot high staggered height cabinets. We initially got a quote of 20K from a cabinet maker for a very basic design in Cherry(no MDF or melamine), with wire management. After calling around we found a small local custom cabinet maker who will do it for about 13-15K with a lot of bells and whistles(stacked crown moulding and nice trim). He saves us money by using some components(a few cabinet boxes and all the doors)from a cabinet manufacturer called Conestoga. We plan on having him do our home office next year.

yakuta: I just got back from my appt. with Lowes. It is not as fully turn key as a place like CA Closets, though I was pleasantly surprised with my Kraftmaid quote. They came in at $5,500 for my cabinets (I don't need that many) with approx. $1,000 for installation. A baseline formica countertop would run approx. $900 and I would need to find a contractor to do the installation. Since my space is quite small, I was a bit disappointed that they did not have as many storage options as a place like CA Closets did where it is a frameless construction and I was loosing drawer space. Options for a keyboard/mouse pullout were not as nice so I would elect to purchase my own and have the countertop person install it. They did have the angled cabinet that I need to really get the look I want and I was able to easily find a door style and finish that I want. I did stick to a less expensive style with a veneered center panel and MDF box construction. As far as measuring, she used CA Closet's measurements and said they only do a site measure (which costs $75), if they do the install--otherwise I was expect to measure myself (and assume the liability if they did not fit).

Tomorrow I'm going to a custom cabinetmaker to see what options they can provide. That may well be my best option--a combination of a custom shop and using a place like Lowes/HD for the countertops.

There is a place (Ultracraft, I think) that people have had success with over on the kitchen forum where they order over the internet and the cabinets are frameless. That could be another option. WIth the shorter desk height and need for drawers, I am just worried I'll loose too much depth in my drawers with framed cabinetry.

Yakuta, Get out your tape measure and measure and plan where and what you want. I'm sure you can get decent cabinets in Lowes or Home depot. Woodworking is our hobby, so I designed a small set of cabinets for over my desk in my den. I wanted it for my technical books, (the glass cabinet) the end cabinets have shelves inside and store the things I need a lot, but don't want on display, (Like my cameras, Tape measure, tattered dictionary, eye glasses,
change jar, etc...My point being, lay out what you want and see if you can get stock cabinets to work.
The other alternative is to lay it out on paper and get an estimate from a cabinet builder. You need to know what wood you want, what finish and what style. I matched my desk and used white QS oak.
Good luck, you can save money if you do some of the legwork yourself.

I have no personal photos, but would suggest that you look into the cost of getting the components built to your specs through an unfinished wood furniture store in your area. I have been shopping for a single hutch bookcase with a drawer base like the pieces on either side of rmkitchen's sofa/futon. I found the most selection at a local unfinished furniture store that is a dealer for companies like inwoodfurniture and woodcraft. They have several customizable options, in maple, pine, and oak (and cherry through some manufacturers) which are solid wood, in varying configurations (shelves,drawers,cabinets, desks, etc.) and trim styles available.

They are not particularly cheap (the piece I like will cost about $900 + a charge to have it stained) but they are solid wood, sturdy, and comparable in price to some of the melamine pieces sold through other vendors. And it's possible to match other pieces to them later if you need something else (that flexibility was my main concern because we are planning a large remodel so I will eventually have room for built-ins or at least a wall of custom freestanding shelves). The store I went to will stain or paint the pieces for you (for an extra charge of course); I'm buying my shelf from a local chain (saah furniture) but I imagine other dealers offer similar services. Anyway, my local store also offers custom kitchen cabinets, so it seems that similar companies should be able to install the wall systems as built-ins or do a combination of upper/lower units.

My husband does woodworking for a hobby and just finished building cabinets for our office/library (I need to put more of our books on the shelves!). Since he built them, I can't advise you on finding a contractor, but this photo might give you some ideas. Our builder (we're in a top floor condo in our city's downtown--that's our rooftop patio outside) said having these built by a contractor would have cost us about $7,000.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{!gwi}}