That kitchen is going to be lovely when it's done. Your renters are lucky. We usually put the cheapest builder-grade, unfinished cabinets from HD in our rentals. I'll throw out this thought just in case you never can find matching doors: some kitchens of that era had different color doors on cabinets. Think Mondrian. It was more common in kitchens with sliding door cabinets but the same concept could still work. I think if you got doors quite different, like one of the black/brown color lines, so there was a lot of contrast and strategically placed the dark doors, it could look quite striking. I almost ordered my kitchen through IKEA during their summer sale but cancelled as soon as I learned about the roll-out of Sektion (Metod in the rest of the world) beginning in February for the very reason you stated. If I get sick of my style in 10 years, it's pretty cheap to just hang new doors/drawer fronts. Also, some of the cabinets I wanted were already out of stock then and I was very concerned about availability. Besides, after playing around with the UK's website and designing a Metod kitchen, I really like the new look and the flexibility in designing this new line gives you so I'm glad I wanted. Not to mention that I hadn't put my thought into the design at that point. Since then places like GardenWeb and IkeaFans has been a goldmine of ideas and I sure like the layout I'm working on now much better. I've read reviews by Europeans who have experience with both the old and new IKEA lines and none of them have expressed concerns with strength or durability of the new line. Anyway, none of that helps you, right? Have you tried ordering online? Although the shipping costs may make that an expensive option, it might be worth checking out.

For support around the fridge, it'll be attached in part to the appliance garage as in the diagram, and I can add a bracket for support if needed (I am adding a shelf, as I mentioned in my first post, which will help support). I feel like the concerns about whether appliances, cabinets will be able to open should be quashed: Fridge doors are absolutely fine to clear all walls, all appliances are completely fine, my counter fabricator will not build a counter that will get in the way of the cabinets, my contractor will not install a cabinet I cannot open, etc. etc. And the kitchen is mostly installed except for filler pieces and countertops (which haven't been ordered yet). To your comment about the pieces: Filler pieces are only *supposed* to be aesthetic, aren't they? So to try to find examples a little more that might illustrate: If I look very closely at my dream/inspiration kitchen here on Houzz, I see an example of my cabinet situation. It looks like half fillers, though ending *above* the counters. This also shows the cabinet door alignment I was afraid of losing with a full filler piece.On the other question about the refrigerator, you might be right that that should have a full panel, for the visual separation. This might be a good example, don't you think? Also shows I could go with a filler on only one side and still maintain the built-in look, perhaps?

Thanks for the feedback everyone! Marcosmcqueen, I'm a little worried about the heat from the oven too. Looking at the cutsheet for the oven, it is about 20" wide and should have a little over 1" on either side. I don't think there is any kind of metal on the sides of the base cabs, but what is a metal crashing? TKP, we've looked at several local dealers (for framed and frameless) and none of them come close to the price of the Ikea cabinets. We had considered Merillat Classic at one point (one of the cheaper options), but I've since decided against framed cabinets, and plus I don't think the Merillats are great quality anyways. Going with Ikea was actually a fairly recent change. We had designed uppers into this kitchen remodel and with Ikea the 15" deep uppers wouldn't have worked out for me, but now that i no longer want uppers, it is possible.

I think this was less so in the pre-Houzz days of gardenweb. No, it was much, much more so. It was that which led Susan Martin to start ikeafans in the first place, because of the scorn and contumely for ikea kitchens here. I well remember that when I first came to GW back around 2004, six-figure kitchens were considered totally normal and if you didn't want granite, you were pretty much shunned. The question wasn't, "What will you do for countertops?" but rather, "Which granite will you get?" Although, to be fair, clever inexpensive updates always did get deserved praise. But the crash certainly made the Kitchens Forum a more democratic kind of place, for sure.