Kitchen Cabinets

"Materializing" the Kitchen Cabinets

Before we just jump in and start placing a bunch of cabinets in our kitchen, I do recommend that we think about what we want them to look like. That is: what materials do we want them to be made of. I've done this many times, and many different ways, and I usually don't know what I want things to look like until I've placed some things and began to look closely at the result.

I never seem to know what kind of material I want for the kitchen cabinets. Well, I may think I know, but I inevitably change my mind. In the world where everything is make-believe (as are all my designs), the choice of materials is generally wide open. I can have it any way I like. You could take that approach, too, but you will find changing all the cabinets around to be a rather tedious task. Changing the cabinet defaults can be a time-saver, but since they are defaults, they will change the cabinets in other parts of the house at the same time. You may or may not want this.

So, assuming we have thought about what we want things to look like and be made of, we can proceed to place cabinets in our kitchen. We start by placing a single base cabinet and a single wall cabinet somewhere inside the kitchen. It's not important where, but let's say we place them along the back (top) wall.

Here are our cabinets:

They are still our basic cream/beige color, and the counter top and backsplash are still the default "countertop blue". Your mileage may vary, depending on the template you started with. The countertop also has a molding applied to it, but note that in many lesser-cost homes these are often omitted.

So, let's make these cabinets look the way we want all the other kitchen cabinets to look. Arbitrarily, I've made decisions on kitchen materials, and those decisions are shown below.

All Cabinets: We're staying with the same beige color (called "Antique" in my color palette). Underneath, the cabinets are made of wood.
Doors: We're going to change these to arched panel doors from our door library, and we're going to uncheck the "Inset Doors" option.
Hardware: Handles and pulls. We're going to select nice knobs for both, and make them a contrasting color to the cabinets.
Countertop: I don't want everything to be beige, and the blue is a nice color, but ... let's change the countertops to "Cobalt", which is a blue-green color. Very nice. We are also going to eliminate the countertop molding.
Backsplash: Sometimes we want it to be the same as the countertop, sometimes we want it to be different. In our case, we're going to make it the same (Cobalt) and set the height to 18".
Wall cabinets: I've decided to set the wall cabinets to 30" high, and place them 54" from the floor. Assuming a 36" counter height (pretty standard), this gives us 18" from countertop to cabinet bottom. And coincidentally, makes our backsplash go all the way to the wall cabinet bottom. Our wall cabinets will be about 13" from the ceiling (HomeDesigner makes our default ceiling height 97 1/8"). The wall cabinet doors will be set to match the base cabinet doors.

The default base cabinet width is 24". This is a reasonable width, but I like to standardize on a 30" to 36" wide cabinet unit. Stoves are typically 30" wide. Sinks are 32" to 42" wide. Refrigerators are 36" wide. It's easier to plan around a 30" to 36" module.

Let's do these things. Either in plan view or in 3D view, select the base cabinet and open the Base Cabinet Specification dialog box.

Tip #22: It can be easy (and fun!) to set materials/colors in 3D view. You can also select objects (such as cabinets) and manipulate their properties, but there is a slight trick to this.

In order to select an object in 3D view, your camera needs either to be primarily facing the front of the object, or the side of the object. Too much of an angle, and you won't be able to select it. This does not stop you from applying a material to the object, however.

You can apply a material to almost any surface that you can "see" in a 3D view. Simply select the material (via the Material Painter) and click the crosshairs on the surface you want to "paint".

Note: If the surface doesn't appear to change color/material, then that almost certainly means that some other object surface changed, and it probably wasn't the one you wanted to change. Use the undo function (CTRL + Z) and undo the last change. You'll then have to use a different technique to change the material of a surface, and/or move the 3D camera.

The Base Cabinet Specification dialog is shown below.

Click on the Library button on the General tab (shown above) and select the arched cabinet door style you like. You will need to expand the cabinet door styles to find one you like. I chose the "RP-1-1ARCH" door style. I also changed the Width to 36", since we will be using that width as a basis for other cabinets. The changed dialog is shown below.

What happened to our cabinet door? It's not the same color as the cabinet, now. No problem, we will simply fix it on the Materials tab when we get to that point. Now, change the Backsplash Height to 18". Note that the default of 6" is not being changed. Click on the Cabinet Front tab, shown below:

Uncheck the Inset Doors option, and check the Stile Between Doors option. You'd need hidden hinges for inset doors, and we've decided to go with standard (less costly) hinges. Having a stile (separation) between opposing doors just means there's a vertical strip between them. I prefer that.

Now, let's go to the Hardware tab. It's shown below.

Change the Door Handle to a knob, and also change the Drawer Handle to a knob. Change the Hinges from hidden to standard. Flip to the Moldings tab.

Notice that there's a half-round molding on the perimeter of the countertop. Click the Delete button, and then let's go to the Materials tab, shown below. Click on the Backsplash (selected, below), and click either in the box (under where it says "Default: Countertop Blue") or click the Select Material button.

In the Select Material dialog box (we've seen this, before), select Countertops in the category dropdown, then select "Countertop Cobalt" in the list box. Click OK.

Do the same for the Countertop. We want them to be the same material.

We're leaving the hardware set to the default, Metal Steel (Polished).

Now, change each part of the cabinet door to the Antique color (same as the rest of the cabinet).

Now, click on OK and let's look at our progress. Not bad.

Now, let's adjust the wall cabinet to our specifications. Select the wall cabinet and open its specification dialog box. I made changes as outlined, above. The first tab of the Wall Cabinet Specification dialog, showing my changes, is shown below:

Click on the Cabinet Front tab, and uncheck Inset Doors and check Stile Between Doors.

Go to the Hardware tab, and select knob for the doors, and standard hinges.

There are no moldings to worry about, so go to the Materials tab and change the door materials to "Color Antique". Click OK to close the dialog. Now we have both a base cabinet and wall cabinet set to our specifications.

On the next page we'll finish placing all the remaining cabinets, primarily by copying and pasting the one cabinet we have made (except for corner cabinets), and then adjusting the widths to fit the spaces we have to fill. So, let's go there.

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