Talk to the company from whom you are buying your cabinets. I think this may vary by company. My own European frameless cabinets arrived with a white side (the cabinets were gray), so a panel had to be used.

My cabinets are being made by a local person.

What should I be asking. At this point my assumption is that the end panels will be constructed of same wood as the door panels and stained the same rather than having the same decorative motif as the doors.

Sometimes I am not sure that I communicate because I don't speak the same language as design and construction people ha ha. It took a LOT of clarification for me to understand exactly what each component I needed for the bathroom was and which one I wanted. Of course I am still not entirely certain why the drain was $350 LOL

But you did make me realize that I should confirm whether the end panels will be quarter sawn oak or rift sawn oak since my door panels are combining these.

There are posts on here (and old GW) about assumptions and cabinets all the time - often the assumptions were wrong. Confirm that what they are making is what you are expecting and what you want.

Thank you - the first picture - i.e. a plain panel like the first picture you posted is what I am getting and - at least to me - looks fine. My design shows a plain panel like the first picture

I was just confused by the poster I quoted from another thread in which it appeared that a plain stained panel on an end cabinet was wrong.

What are "decorative applied door panels" which the poster I quoted said were "required". I assume that "decorative applied door panels" mean they look like the door but it appears the standard is just to have a plain stained side - which I prefer and which was in my design plans. Are the plain panels in the first picture considered to be "decorative applied door panels"?

To clarify - I am absolutely fine with the look of the first picture. In fact I find the second and third to not be as aesthetically pleasing to me but I had assumed that those were what was meant by "decorative applied door panels".

Usually with cover panels you will have two options:

1) A flat slab (it sounds like you'll be getting oak doors, so this would be a quarter/rift sawn oak veneer). This flat slab panel will usually be edge-banded on the front edge but can sometimes have a thicker piece of solid wood on the front edge as an upgrade.

-or-

2) A panel that basically matches your doors. (It looks like your designer was recommending you not choose this option.)

For larger applications, such as island/peninsula ends or refrigerator end (the cover panel on the left or right side of a refrigerator opening) this panel (if matching a traditional panel-in-frame door style such as Shaker) will usually have center stiles or rails to help support the structure of the panel and also to visually break up the panel into segments. These center stiles or rails can be strategically placed to match the height/locations of stiles and rails found elsewhere in your kitchen. An example of this might be placing a center rail (the horizontal frame member that divides the inner panel) at the same height as the upper rail on the doors on your base cabinets. This would create visual continuity.

Usually the backs of peninsulas can have several center stiles (vertical dividing frame members.) Usually these center stiles are placed every 12" to 15". These panels are sometimes referred to as wainscot panels.

We tend to recommend to customers that these cover panels get sized so that their front edges sit flush with the fronts of your doors and drawer fronts. Sometimes people will have their cover panels on upper cabinets drop an inch or two below the frame of the cabinet so that they can fit light rail molding between the two cover panels and below the cabinet box (this would be in lieu of cutting your light rail molding to have mitered returns back to the wall.)

Frameless cabinets require a different approach to designing than framed cabinets. They are plain white or maple melamine coated boxes to which you basically attach a panel choice. That panel has a 3/4” thickness that must be acclunted for in the design measurements. Yes as Mark stated above, some offer a version of a finished side, but it has design limitations within that choice that are specific to the line.

Traditional framed cabinets will offer many finishing solutions for sides that work within the overall box measurement, meaning that a 36” wide cabinet with the left side exposed will still be 36” wide. It won’t be 36”, plus a 3/4” applied panel.

There are some situations with frameless that you want to do an applied panel, but that is usually with lower cost lines that won’t combine cabinets, and then offer a finished integrated end.

Theres a lot more technical stuff that goes into this. But that is basically the overview.