aklvdb, yes we are also in MB (bit of a shocker waking up to -30 again this morning). We have kitchen craft cabs and I'll tell you what I know, but it is horribly out of date since we did our kitchen 8 years ago. Kitchen Craft was smaller company and dealt with a lot of small local contractors. They had a good product with great quality control. Right around when we did our kitchen, they were expanding to deal with big building companies and starting to go big and bulk. They started to have quality control problems just because they were expanding so fast. I don't know how those problems were resolved as we haven't dealt with our contractor (he had been using KC for years and his wife was a KC designer/sales). When we bought ours, we weren't even shown MDF as an option (that I remember). We were told maple was a great paintable wood and we've been very happy. When I was looking for bathroom cabs about 5 years ago, I looked at many companies including Jake Klassen and noticed a few MDF doors (Klassen told me that was all they would do for the type of door I wanted). I can't remember which showroom it was, but I remember seeing MDF doors with the edges smushed and crushed. I ended up having a local carpenter make my bathroom cabinets - they were cheaper and are a work of art. No regrets there. Our house is over 100 years old and my bias is to real anything. Much of our furnishings are antique wood and my soft furniture is all covered in linen or cotton. I would rather live with a crack in real wood than have perfect MDF. I completely admit that prejudice. You have to decide yourself what is important to you.

My hubby designed and built all of our cabinetry for our kitchen remodel. The cabinet doors are actually solid maple for the shaker style frame part and the inside of the panel is actually maple plywood. The plywood is still a floating panel inside the door part... that gets kind of technical about the building procedure, but it was cheaper than using solid maple that he would have to join... He sprayed the paint on after the doors were fully assembled. You can see in the closeup photo that there are some hairline cracks in some of the seams where the shaker frames meet. I can honestly say they don't bother me a bit... they're not at every seam, but they are here and there. To me it is just a reminder that we have real wood under that paint and it's part of the character of the kitchen. But you would have to judge that for yourself, what bothers you is likely different than what would bother me. Our kitchen is a mix of solid wood and plywood, but my hubby refused to work with MDF. (The cabinet boxes are also maple plywood, the insides of my cabinets and doors are left a natural color with just a clear shellac coat on the inside.)

MDF is fine depending on the brand of cabinets. I'm assuming they mean just the center panels are MDF? I'm in SW Florida and went with all wood because that's what the Amish cabinet maker I used uses. I'm not quite in the house yet, but I knew going in that there would at some point be some hairline "cracking" of the joints. I'm fine with it as to me it's part of the beauty of wood. YMMV.

Thank you everyone for your time. I appreciate your feed back and value your opinions. I am a reasonable person and just looking for advice to ensure that I am not being taken advantage of. My contract clearly states, Maple. We have had our kitchen custom made with dovetail soft close drawers and hard rock melamine boxes. We had originally gotten quotes at those box retail stores as we started to layout our dream kitchen. It was than, when I was doing my research that we decided we wanted wood. I don’t expect to get anything for free. I just want to pay for what I got. For the size of our project, I was originally quoted $55k for wood and $40k for MDF with the box retailers. The plan was to wait for a “Kitchen Event” when they would offer 20% discount or save the tax. That way we could get the wood kitchen for the approximate price of MDF. Therefore, I know there is a price difference between wood and MDF. I also realize this price point was for the entire project, including install. When working with my overall contractor, he suggested getting a quote from this custom cabinetry/woodworking company. I was pleasantly surprised, when we were able to get exactly what I wanted IN WOOD as well as not having to sacrifice any inches, as compared with the box retailers. We were able to fully customize our sizes, where the box retailers limited you to standard size boxes with fillers. More importantly, since they came in right at our budget of $40k, I did not get them to specifically quote us on their price difference between MDF and wood. We did not pay upfront, as I recommend no one ever do! We did everything right, paid the deposit, paid an installment upon delivery and last installment upon completion. We must have been blinded by the beauty. Keep in mind, we went through a $200k 16-month renovation. We took it right back to the studs, knocked out walls, no flooring, no ceiling, limited lights, limited plumbing, dust and dirt and no kitchen for about 6 weeks. So, once it stated to get put back together, we were just so thrilled, that honestly didn’t look that closely. As others have commented it is hard to tell the difference between wood and MDF when they are painted. We were also well aware of the risks. That the paint could crack/chip if the wood expended etc. However, we never wanted to deal with MDF again, after ripping it out of our old kitchen. The main benefits of wood for us, was knowing they would be more durable, and we could repaint them in future. Apples to Apples, I just can’t find a clear-cut answer on the price difference for wood to MDF based just on the door fronts/panels. I realize some say there is no price difference, but I have quotes stating otherwise. But on a percentage basis, I am not sure what the door/panels cost in relation to the whole project. Regardless of price, they will have to replace all the fronts with wood, according to my contract. They have admitted to making a mistake. I would have been willing to accept financial consideration if it had been reasonable. I honestly, don’t think he is being reasonable at $9/door or panel. If he must replace it all, with new material, labour to make and labour to install it will cost him a lot more than $700. I don’t feel I am being unreasonable, nor does my overall contractor. I was just hoping to get a better idea on the price difference between the two. Since we were only looking at getting the fronts replaced. I am not sure it is fair to use the price difference of the entire project as a comparison. I have limited time during regular business hours, usually the only time when the custom places are open. Reason why my other quotes of from box retailers who are open until 9-10pm at night. I was only looking for some guidance where it is available 24 hours a day! I plan on taking the time now to get our plans re-quoted at 2-3 custom cabinetry places, even if I have to pay for them to do it. I will be seeking legal advice as I suspect the difference to be in the thousands on this size of project.