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Building a Home Design Dilemma Kitchens

Should I go with 42" kitchen wall cabinets?

4 years ago

Hi guys,

I'm very new to this. We are buying a new construction and the kitchen has 36" standard wall cabinets with 9 ft ceiling. Kitchen is about 10x14, open floor plan. Minus window/stove, there's about 22 ft linear space for cabinets. We asked about option to upgrade to 42" and fill the space to ceiling with simply plywood + crown molding. We were quoted $2.5k. Is this a reasonable price? I thought 42"H is still be a pretty standard cabinet.

The alternative would be to stay with 36" and decide if we ever want to put in stacked cabinets (glass panel) in the future. I personally like this look + more storage, but this involves complexity and probably custom cabinets which will cost more.

What's your suggestion?

Featured Answer

emilyam819

4 years ago

42 + all the extra trim for $2.5K sounds like a steal.

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Comments (7)

Sammy
4 years ago
$2,500 sounds more than reasonable to me.
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chispa
4 years ago
Sounds fair. Do it now and you can move in and enjoy your kitchen and not worry about future renovations.
Miranda33
4 years ago
You could also do 42" cabinets with space to the ceiling, and not have the "simply plywood + crown molding". With the low price of $2.5k, and that description, I'd want to see what they are talking about. It could look good. Or it could look like a basic builder's special 1990's soffit, which you would have been better off without. You need to see a pic of what they mean by "simply plywood + crown molding".

I would not do the 36" cabinets with a 9' ceiling under any circumstance. Putting in a stack on top is expensive to begin with, and even more expensive after-the-fact, like, really expensive. And it will be difficult to match the new stack with the existing cabinetry. And if you end up leaving the 36" cabinets as is, you will be forever regretting not going with the 42" cabinets.
Sammy
4 years ago
Assuming base cabinet height of 36” and backsplash height of 18”: 42” uppers will leave 12” dead space; 36” uppers will leave 18”.

In my opinion, 12” is too tall an opening to be filled with trim in new construction. If these were existing cabinets that you were trying to make the best of in a budget-conscious renovation, then that’s something else.

Is your goal to not have any open space above the cabinets? If so, why? What cabinet brand are you using? Have you priced out any alternatives like 36” + 12” or 39”?
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PRO
Mark Bischak, Architect
4 years ago
How tall are you? How tall is your wife? Who cooks?
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Marie J.
4 years ago
I’m building and the 42’’ option was more than yours. I live alone, am 5’5’’ and will never use the top shelf in my 36’‘ cabinets, so I spent money elsewhere. Even 42s didn’t go all the way up to the 9 foot ceiling and IMO looked only slightly better. Is there a model you could look at first?
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