We did that! The wall behind the fridge is drywall to drywall, with the studs cut out in that spot and a beam overhead for support. Then the surrounding cabinets come out, I think, 2 inches past the standard counter depth. With this setup, it will never look truly built-in, because standard fridges need clearance for the doors so that they can open properly. So, the door part still sticks out (see second pic in post below). Doesn't bother me a bit. We couldn't have gotten it back any further anyway without recessing into the adjacent room or bumping the cabs out so far they would look strange.

I think we got three inches from going back in the framing, 2 inches from the cabs sticking out past the counter (note this allows the counter to die into the cab instead of having a countertop corner, which we also would have wanted).

Doors still stick out a bit:

I recessed my fridge into the wall and gained 3 inches in depth. Sorry no pics. We had a wonderful cabinetmaker who did our custom cabinets beautifully.

The second part of the equation is that we bought an LG standard depth fridge--which has 25 cubic ft. of storage in a French door style. It's depth is 34 1/4 which is the shallowest I could find, at the time, 3 and 1/2 years ago--for a standard, not counter depth unit. hth

Mine is still in the planning stages. But I had the wall next to the fridge built 29" instead of 24-25" like it would normally be done.

The upper cabinet next to the fridge is being made extra deep, as is the panel for the right side of the fridge. I am then mounting all other cabinets a few inches out from the back wall.

My counter will have to be a few inches deeper than normal, which gives me the added bonus of space behind the sink under the window for an herb garden. And the 1 cabinet I am having made extra deep will be actually be big enough to hold plates. (My current kitchen has the standard 12" deep uppers. That's 12" on the outside. The previous cabinets were 12" on the inside and I never had any issues fitting things in the cupboard. But when we redid the kitchen, we had to move everything around because a bunch of our dishes no longer fit in the uppers.)

This is the kitchen in my previous home while it was still under construction. the nrefrigerator was a full size KA. We built out the surrounding caninetry to about 30", including the cabinet over the fridge. the lower cabinet to the left was set back to about 25" (design choice). when done, there was another strip above the fridge hiding the gap.

We arranged the kitchen so the fridge area backed into a living room coat closet. The contractor built a box into the living room closet and we now hang coats on hooks instead of hangers.

We arranged the kitchen so the fridge area backed into a living room coat closet. The contractor built a box into the living room closet and we now hang coats on hooks instead of hangers.

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30' deep fridge enclosure with 30" cabinet above. 30" base cab next to it, with normal depth upper.

These look great! And Buehl, your slideshow was very helpful. Thanks, all!

Still haven't started our kitchen remodel but we were able to borrow 6" from the oversize utility/laundry room and will recess the frig 30". I was so excited when I realized how slick this would be. I did not want to loose frig space.

In our last two kitchens, we were able to recess the fridge into the wall several inches so it was flush with surrounding base cabinets. In the kitchen we did in 2001, we were limited to narrow aisles, so we didn't want the fridge sticking out. In our current kitchen we were able to do the same thing, but just for aesthetics. In both kitchens we had the cabinet over the fridge built out to the same depth as the fridge. The same cabinet maker did both kitchens.

This is the kitchen we renovated in 2001.
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This is our current kitchen.

I would have liked to have had a full-depth refrigerator and recessed it into the back wall. However, our refrigerator is on an exterior wall, so recessing was not an option.

We do have a second refrigerator in the basement, so we're OK with refrigerated space. I found that a 36" cabinet-depth refrigerator wasn't enough while our kids were growing up (two kids). I suspect, however, that once we're empty nesters the one refrigerator will be enough. Then we'll probably just use the second refrigerator during holidays and, possibly, the summer for drinks (it will be off other times).

[We generally shop just once every week or two b/c of the distance to a decent supermarket and b/c we both work full time outside the home and wanted to minimize our "away" time, so we'd stock up - hence the need for more refrigerated space!]

We weren't able to recess, but we were able to build the wall of cabinets out to achieve a recessed effect.