70's Bungalow: Progress 2

The tile work is almost finished and the hardwood has just started to be installed.  The finish carpenter is on site prepping doors and getting ready to install the base mouldings and door casings.  And the custom kitchen cabinetry arrives this week for installation,,,,,,I'm sooooo excited to see it!!!   I stopped by the job site earlier today to drop some more paint samples off for the Master Bedroom and was thrilled with the progress since I was there earlier in the week and since my last progress post.   The travertine tile has gone up on the Living Room fireplace wall and I LOOOOOVE it (above photo).

The guest bathroom tile is just about ready to be grouted, they have to just finish off adding a Caesarstone jamb around the inside of the window, you can see a small piece of it on the window sill now that the tiler was using as a spacer.  The grid line effect will disappear once the grout is applied.

  

You can just see a glimpse of the honed travertine floor tile.

Honed calacatta floor tiles in the master ensuite and paint draw downs on the wall.  Wall tile goes up on Monday (where you see the black backer board).  You can check out the design sketches and finish boards for the bathrooms here.

The powder room has polished calacatta floor tiles and I can tell you the wall paint, is NOT going to be the bottom sample : ).

The natural walnut floors were installed in the kitchen and family room yesterday, here's a look at the range wall which is ready for the cabinets and appliances.  I love how the space is flooded with daylight.  For over six months now I've had a clear vision of what this kitchen will look like when its complete but if you want a 'sneak peek' you can check out the kitchen design plans here.

A view into the kitchen from the family room.  If you look close you can see a couple of paint draw downs on the left wall inside the kitchen,,,and I'm happy to say the perfect shade of white has been selected (we'll be painting all the main living areas and hallways white).  Although I have to say, the primer the painter used on this job is the nicest colour of white primer I've ever seen, I would be perfectly happy with that as the wall colour it was really that good - I'll definitely be getting the name of it.

Another view into the kitchen from the family room at the back of the house, I love how you can see the Living room's travertine fireplace in background.

Details make the difference.

My favorite thing on the entire project,,,,are these walnut veneer doors.  They arrived earlier this week and the wood veneer is simply stunning!!!!  Even now in their unfinished state you can see the sheer beauty of the walnut grain, its like a work of art.   This character and depth of colour will be accentuated even more when the clear top coats are applied.  What you're seeing here is only the top half of the door, there's four doors altogether, bookmatched, and they'll be hung in pairs on the two closets in the front hall.

Stay tuned for lots more progress updates in the days and weeks ahead.

All Photos:   Carol Reed

Gail's Kitchen Reno: Post #3- Progress

Its been 3 months of debris and dust.....finally its time for all the new finishes and fixtures!

After 3 months of demolition and new construction we're finally getting to all the exciting finishing details at Gails' Kitchen.  Just when it seems like things are moving along at a snail's pace, suddenly you hit a point when everything starts to come together quickly with visible progress every day.  Its like Christmas morning each time I visit the site now!!  While the contractor's been working on the new construction I've been finalizing a few design details like the fireplace surround, ordering light fixtures, sourcing some new stools and finalizing the hardware selections.

A couple of weeks ago we purchased the Ikea cabinets which were delivered next day - EDIT:  for immediate delivery you have to pick the entire order in the warehouse yourself.  Otherwise for large orders you should have them pick the order for you which means allow at least 2 weeks for delivery of the order which comes from their main distribution warehouse.

My absolute favorite part of any job is when the primer goes up.  I LOVE to see the new space painted entirely white, in many cases its the only time I get to enjoy the beauty of the whiteness of the space before the clients 'colour' goes up!  Personally I always think the spaces look better in white,,,, but hey,,, its not about what I want because its not my house.

When the hardwood flooring arrived on site I handpicked all the boards.  I specified a character grade wood that has lots of knots but which also means you can get lots of variance in the appearance with some really odd ball pieces thrown in there too.  With this much character in the wood its important that the boards are thoughtfully placed or it could look like a dogs breakfast, so I sort them into 3 piles of bad, good and best.  Instead of tossing out the 'bad' boards I have the installer use them in areas where they won't be visible like under all the kitchen cabinets, under the appliances and under the sofa.

I sampled 7 shades of yellow paint before we could find one that we were happy with.  Yellow has to be one of the trickiest colours of all to get right, it doesn't help that I'm not a yellow person but I appreciate my client's attraction to it.  We applied each of the samples on three different walls and not only did the yellows look drastically different on each wall, the same colour often looked totally different on the same wall.  Looking at all these samples above, except for the two whites the others looked nothing like the paint samples in hand, NOTHING.  From left to right, bottom row we have; BM Creme Brulee, BM Creme Fraiche, BM Affinity Soleil, F&B Cream, F&B House White, BM Cotton Balls, BM Spanish White (LOVE), BM Ivory White (LOVE).  Top row is a second sample of BM Creme Brulee which looks nothing like the sample on the far left.  The homeowner didn't pick either of the ones that would have been my first choice but she's madly crazy in love with the one she did pick!

I was so excited a couple of weeks ago to meet the Coppersmith at the house and review samples of antiqued, hammered copper. He'll make the copper patina to our exact liking and then he'll use it to build us a custom hood canopy exactly like my design sketch - I can't wait to see it!!!!

But before the Coppersmith left the building,,,,,I lured him into the family room and pulled out my design sketches for the fireplace and asked him if he could use that same copper to make a surround for the new fireplace.  No problem he said, piece of cake.  Now, that's the kinda response I like to hear!!  So he'll be back to measure for the surround as soon as the gas fireplace box is installed.

Nothing gets my heart beating faster than found treasure,,, and an enthusiastic contractor. : ))  My clients are currently living in one of their own rental properties during this renovation and in the garage of that house we found stacks of antique wood boards from the previous owner who was a woodworker.  I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw these beauties piled up in the junk pile.  With their live edge and the gorgeous wood grain my mind was realing thinking of all the different ways we could use these.  I sketched up a detail for a sliding barn style door and Tom's going to have these boards made into an oversize door panel, and then,,we'll use the rest to make the mantle for the fireplace.

They started installing the base cabinets on Wednesday....

By Monday we'll be ready for the counters to be templated.  

Meanwhile the cabinet doors and drawer fronts are off getting sprayed a perfect shade of white.  Check out this post for all the details we have planned, and check out this post for step by step process of how I have Ikea cabinets custom sprayed (note this is not a DIY project!).

Stay tuned for more updates over the next 4 weeks as this dramatic kitchen, family room transformation comes to completion. 

All Photos:  Carol Reed

Gail's Kitchen Reno: Post #2 - Customizing Ikea

Gails' kitchen and family room renovation is a project of mine that's currently in the early stages of construction. I first posted about this kitchen and family room renovation a couple of weeks ago and if you missed it, you can go here to see all the before pictures and read all about the objectives for the redesign and the process behind developing the final proposed layout.  Here's another look at the new floor plan....

Its quite an extensive renovation with lots of new construction and reworking of plumbing and electrical so one of the ways to achieve everything on the wish list (quartz counters, high end appliances, all new floors, additional sinks, new fireplace etc. etc.) and stay within the clients conservative budget range is to use Ikea cabinets as the basis for the kitchen design.  In this post I won't bother going into all the reasons why this makes so much sense as I've written about all the reasons Why I love Ikea Kitchens here, and its for all those reasons why my client and I came to the decision to take this route for her new kitchen.   Also in that post you can find a list of my favorite ways to customize Ikea cabinets and give it a bespoke look - I'll be implementing all of those tricks in this installation too.   

When planning a kitchen based on Ikea cabinets I treat the base cabinetry like building blocks,,,or legos and configure them in any which way I need them.  There's really not too many limitations as they offer such a wide range of cabinet sizes and styles.  Since this kitchen will be more on the relaxed trad side than the modern side,,,,,I recommended the Tidaholm door style which is a simple shaker style door in natural oak.  As I've mentioned previously I prefer this door style over their other shaker door style the Adel, because the Tidaholm has a cleaner squared edge shaker profile and joinery corners.  Also its key, if you plan on painting the doors the oak doors take a new paint finish better than the Adel door style which is a synthetic polyester finish.  And for this project, we definitely intend on painting them!

The Cooktop Wall:  Essentially this is the main wall in the kitchen which houses the rangetop, exhaust hood and wall ovens.  This was a major change from the old kitchen layout which had a cooktop poorly (and dangerously) located on a narrow island.  I always place ranges or cooktops against walls where ever possible and try to allow counter space on either side.  In this configuration we have lots of extra deep drawers which will accommodate pots, pans, small appliances, mixing bowls, cookware, as well as spices, seasonings and utensils and knives.  The open shelves will house most of the dishware with additional pieces in the glass fronted hutch.  The shelves will provides easy access for Gail (who is a chef) who's always cooking for a crowd.  I've incorporated a desk space for her laptop, cookbooks, messages, and household bills.  I'm on the lookout for an old antique wall hutch that we could use above her desk surface but its not something you can easily find on a deadline, so in this elevation I've illustrated the backup plan which will be new glass fronted wall cabinets with a blue accent colour painted on the inside.  The range hood canopy will be custom built and we're planning on cladding it in an antiqued distressed copper,,much more blackened in appearance than shiny new copper.  (sorry but the colours depicted in this renderring are not quite accurate, the walls will be a very soft fresh pale yellow, all the cabinetry a warm ivory white).

The Island:  The sink side of the island is of course directly opposite the cook wall and despite how large the island is, I still couldn't fit everything in that Gail ideally wanted, but we're as close as we could get.  They'll be a Shaw farmsink, a second prep sink (that was a must!) and a set of refridgerator drawers.  Its these fridge drawers that really make her prep zone and cooking zone work efficiently, she can keep all her dairy and veg here, where they'll be right at hand instead of in the large main fridge.  The biggest challenge about this island has been trying to light it, you can't help but notice it only has a ceiling over half of it! The ceiling goes from 8' in the kitchen area opening up to 20' in the breakfast nook area so its a bit a challenge.  The situation just became more challenging when last week we discovered a new beam would need to be dropped exactly where I've got the light fixture hanging........

The Island:  On one end of the island they'll be another set of wide deep drawers and the other three sides of the island will be clad in a combination of operable doors and fixed door panels all finished off with a baseboard treatment around the bottom instead of a toe kick.  On the seating side of the island I'll be supporting the overhang with some simple corbel style brackets and also adding a small bookshelf unit with beadboard backing.

The Pantry & Bar:  Like the island, this section of cabinetry will be tricked out with additional trimwork to give it more of a furniture look, so in addition to the Ikea base cabinets the contractor will be installing beadboard back panel,,,corbel brackets and corner block details to the base, and built in recessed puck lighting.  I have to admit this elevation is a moving target right now,,,,its actually been changed several dozen times, probably 2 or 3 since this version was drawn.  The size of the wine fridge was the subject of many debates between my clients and my recommendation for a tall but narrow unit ultimately was vetoed for this double door style.  As for the cabinetry, Gail's been quite conflicted as to how much open vs. closed storage she can live with and I predict we'll be going back to one of the original pantry configurations I proposed which had more upper cabinets, less open shelving which will be more practical.   Right after this is posted I'll be working on one more variation of this wall.

Coming up next I'll share some images of the concept board for the space illustrating all the finishes and fixtures I've specified for the space along with some updated site photos.  

Next week I'll be writing a separate post outlining my tips and advice for painting your newly ordered Ikea cabinets based on the process I've used successfully.  I've had several people inquire about this so please know I havn't forgotten and I promise you'll see it next week.

All Images:  Carol Reed

New Project: Gail's Kitchen Reno

It all started back in December of ’09 when I had my initial meeting with a new client to discuss their kitchen/family room/mud room renovation, a back to the bricks complete overhaul.  They’d been dreaming of this kitchen overhaul for close to 15 years and suddenly it was now or never,,,,,,it was time to either redo these spaces or go in search of a new house that had a kitchen and family room that better suited their needs.

The house is located in the picturesque town of Oakville (west of Toronto) and is an old stone tudor style house situated on a huge treed lot.  The three areas that I was going to be redesigning -  the mudroom, the kitchen and family room made up the back of the house which was a rear, 2 storey addition built in the ‘80‘s and done by the previous owners.  

Before: Here’s a plan view of the kitchen and family room as it existed when I first met the homeowners.

Part of the kitchen opened up to a tall vaulted cathedral ceiling, but spanning straight across this tall ceiling space was a catwalk.  Immediately upon seeing the kitchen the first thing I thought was - that catwalk has got to go!   Its never used, it leads to an unusable rooftop deck, it detracts from the 20’ high ceiling and is just collecting dust.  From a design perspective it had no redeeming qualities or purpose.

The Design Brief:  Gail is a home chef who used to cater private functions but now cooks only for her own family and friends,,,,,,,,,with 3 young adult daughters, a dog and an open door policy to neighbours and friends - its a crazy busy house and the party is always in the kitchen.  Pop in on any given Friday, Saturday or Sunday night and you’ll find her cooking up a feast for 12 or 20 people, usually all spur of the moment and impromptu!  You've seen the existing floor plan shown above, now here’s a glimpse of what their old kitchen looked like for the past 15 years.

Yes, that's a catwalk on the upper left!

View from the family room to the kitchen.

View from the kitchen to the family room.

You’ll understand from seeing some of the photos why this combined kitchen family room space just wasn’t working for them - improvements were needed all around, new flooring, better layout, more counter space, more seating space, larger capacity appliances, a second sink, better lighting,,and in general a kitchen that was current and fresh looking and that was more in keeping with the character of the century old house.

The deep saturated multi-coloured walls, seashore collectables  and open cabinets made for lots of visual clutter.  

My vision:  A lighter fresher colour palette with relaxed coastal charm, lots of white cabinetry, painted beadboard, distressed wood floors, classic fixtures and pro style appliances.  In otherwords, good-by generic dated, golden oak builders kitchen with its santa fe colour scheme....hello Something’s Gotta Give,,,,,,,,,,,or,,, something along those lines.  The set design of the Hamptons beach house for the 2007 movie Something's Gotta Give was by far the biggest star of that production - it was even featured in  Architectural Digest, taking on an iconic status.  That house spawned a renewed appreciation for relaxed traditional interiors, particularly the classic white kitchen - and that's exactly what Gail's house needed.  

SGG Kitchen seen in Architectural Digest

SGG Living Room as seen in Architectural Digest

Diane Keaton on the set..

Diane Keaton and Jack Nicolson on the set.....

If you're a decorating or design junkie and you havn't seen this movie, its worth buying, not renting, buying. I have the dvd (given to me by a client who was building her own SGG inspired weekend house on Lake Simcoe) and I've watched the move dozens of times, just to admire the interiors.

The Design Concept:  Gail's house is not a formal style house, it probably was a cottage originally so it has more informal, pared down architectural detailing.  Because she loves to cook and cooks a LOT, this kitchen needs to be highly practical and functional with pro style appliances and must have seating for lots of guests.  The homeowners vision was not immediately as clear as mine however, but only because she hadn’t seen the movie, seriously, - SHE HADN’t SEEN THE MOVIE “Somethings Gotta Give”!  Regardless, I knew from discussions with her and her love of all things traditional and her ADDICTION to all things beachy that she and I were on the same page.  She rented the movie the following week and like millions of others, fell completely in love with not only the kitchen, the entire house.  Now you might think,,,yawn, boring,,nothing new or cutting edge here, a classic white kitchen - but really, for someone who’s only ever had one kitchen that looks like above,,,,this IS all new and would be beyond her dreams.  Just because its a style that’s timeless it doesn’t mean it has to be boring, when traditional is done right it should be new and current looking - it should be magical.  Besides, its really only the overall character of the SGG kitchen we’ll use as inspiration by maintaining several of its main elements;  traditional white cabinets, dark counters, stainless steel appliances, white subway tile backsplash, vintage inspired fixtures.  The rest of the details will be unique to Gails style and her space.  We’ll be incorporating a light coloured wood floor, soft buttery yellow walls, a dramatic range hood canopy and wall shelves instead of glass fronted cabinets.   This is going to be one dramatic transformation!

The Final Plan: After exploring more than a dozen layout options, this was the winning plan.   Along with the catwalk, the walls around the pantry area will be removed, making room for a large convergent style island and a long pantry/bar wall.  The existing kitchen table will be reused and ideally butted up to the new island to form one big continuous seating arrangement for chef’s table style dining or for spreading out buffets.   The addition of a second prep sink to the island was a difficult one to accommodate but one that Gail concluded was a must have.  The existing fridge is being reused, despite the door swing which has always swung the wrong way, this is something she's learned to live with, a full height freezer tower will be added next to it.  One of the keys to this layout working efficiently is the addition of refrigerator drawers in the island directly beside the prep sink.  These drawers will be used for veg and dairy so they're right at hand in the prep zone which reduces the frequency of going to the main fridge.  

It was a challenging kitchen to design because of the traffic flow, with multiple doorways and staircases leading off the kitchen and a change in floor level, there were definitely a lot of obstacles to work around and loads of requirements to meet.  But I think with this plan, we managed to tick all the boxes and meet the budget!

The final design plans and material selections were completed in early March and the search for a contractor began...

Set of working drawings and material sample board for the site.

After going thru a lengthy bidding process we were fortunate to get an amazing contractor on board (one I've worked with before). He's as enthusiastic about the new design plan as Gail and I are, he brings a positive energy to the project and so far has been a pleasure to work with.  Demolition took place a few weeks ago and the new construction is well underway.  We had our first regular site meeting yesterday and as you can see from the photos below, the space is looking better already!

The catwalk has been removed.

Stay tuned, next week I'll be posting more design drawings of the kitchen illustrating all of the design details we're incorporating and the new cabinetry configuration.  Following that I'll be posting about all the new lighting and plumbing fixtures and photographing the progress on site.

Oh and by the way,,,,did I mention this was going to be (yet another) Ikea kitchen!  Or 'Bespoke Ikea' as I like to call it.

Why I Love IKEA Kitchens

Customized Kitchen with Ikea base cabinets - by Carol Reed Interior Design

Customized Ikea Kitchen - by Carol Reed Interior Design 

Photographed by Michael Graydon for Canadian House & Home

Ikea Kitchen - by Carol Reed Interior Design

This won’t be the first time you hear me declare my love for Ikea kitchen cabinets.  I designed and installed my first Ikea kitchen about 7 years ago and I’ve been a loyal fan ever since.  The three photos above are of some of my favorites that I've designed, one I've posted about previously (see cover of Canadian House & Home link in the sidebar) and the other two will be featured in future posts.   For anyone who has doubts about the quality of Ikea kitchens or for those who think its just not good enough for them, I have a little secret to let you in on.......Designers and Architects LOVE Ikea kitchens and use them all the time, have been for years.   We were quick to recognize the hardware they use is the same we were specifying for our custom millwork jobs,,,,and that we could shave 2 months off our construction schedules because this stuff was off the shelf!   When your budget and timeline are tight, you just can't beat it.  But it hasn’t been until more recently that the option of using ikea cabinetry has become more mainstream and appreciated for its great price and quality.  Here's another little secret, I have clients in quite affluent neighborhoods opting for Ikea over custom - some actually request plain, unmarked delivery trucks so their neighbours won't know!!!!  True story ; ) 

To really appreciate the quality, design and selection offered by Ikea you first have to have an understanding of kitchen cabinetry in general and what is available on the market.   Anyone who turns their nose up at Ikea cabinets is either completely in the dark or their kitchen budget is in a different stratosphere than the average homeowner.  Basically unless you’re going for a custom wood kitchen (meaning the base cabinets are made of wood, sized to fit, and start at at least $35k) then every other option you’ll look at will consist of base cabinets made from melamine, this goes for in-stock cabinetry and semi-custom cabinetry at Home Depot, Rona et al, and even semi-custom kitchen companies like AYA and Canac and Cameo - are all melamine base cabinetry.  And I can tell you, no other stock cabinetry has drawer boxes nearly as good as Ikea nor do they use high quality Blum hinges like Ikea does, never mind they don’t have nearly the selection of cabinets or interior organizers to chose from.   As for the kitchen companies, I have seen one of these companies that uses the exact same drawer boxes as Ikea and the same hinges, but none of them have as many cabinet sizes to chose from nor the interior accessories - and they’re at least 2 to 3 times the price, even factoring in installation.  I just have a hard time justifying to anyone why you should pay $20k or more for melamine cabinets that you can get for $6k or $7k.  These serious costs savings mean you can splurge on counters and appliances - which in my opinion is much better value for your money than expensive melamine cabs.

As far as new home construction goes, with few exceptions, they have some of the  poorest quality kitchens i’ve ever seen despite their luxury price tags.  Last year I toured a development in Yorkville which was selling multi-million dollar luxury condominiums ($2M and up),,,,of course the first thing I checked out was the kitchen cabinetry and sure enough behind the lovely wood cabinet doors was your basic melamine cabinet with cheap hinges and really lousy, poor quality drawer boxes.  

With all melamine base cabinets being equal (although not all drawer boxes are!) what it comes down to is you’re ultimately buying a door style.  Aesthetically, this is what your kitchen is all about because obviously its the visible part of your kitchen.  To me, this is the biggest differential between Ikea and any other kitchen options because Ikea certainly doesn’t offer the range of doors and glass that the kitchen companies do.  So you have to weigh the benefits of paying a premium for a company that offers more door styles or, compromising on your door style so you can take those savings and put that money into counters and appliances.   Alternately, if Ikea doesn’t offer a door style that you like then you can customize one of their doors (spraying) or simply order your doors elsewhere from a company like Cabinet Mart, an on-line supplier of made to measure doors.

Below are some photos of other Ikea installations published in various magazines, mostly from the UK magazine Living Etc.  I really think the Europeans do Ikea best, probably because they take a more utilitarian approach to kitchens, the cabinets are never the ‘feature’ of the room, always simple and understated.

Customized Ikea Kitchen - Living Etc. November 06

Sleek & White -  Living Etc.

A monochrome look in stainless - Living Etc., January 06

Mixed with antique buther block - Living Etc. March 08.

Ikea Stainless  - Living Etc. July 09

Rustic Loft Kitchen - Living Etc. December 08

White Kitchen - Living Etc. April 08

White & Wood kitchen in a Swedish flat -  Kitchen via Desire to Inspire

My favorite door style of Ikea's is the Applad white or any of their simple plain slab doors, they're understated and timeless.  For a more traditional look I like the Tidaholm shaker style but I'm not a fan of the natural oak colour so I prefer it with a custom sprayed finish.  The photos below are not Ikea kitchen installations (I'm pretty sure the 3rd one down is but I just wasn't able to confirm), however you can get this same look with Ikea.

Kitchen Design by Timothy Mather photographed for Canadian House & Home.

Sleek Glossy White - Living Etc. July 07

Living Etc.

Here’s a brief summary of my thoughts on Ikea:

The BENEFITS:

• IN STOCK
• excellent value,,,top quality hardware
• love their drawer boxes
• huge selection of cabinet styles
• their butcher block counters are fantastic value
• amazing selection of interior organizers
• limitless design possibilities using their standard cabinets
• 12”depths avail. including drawers
• automatic self-closing drawers are standard
• RETURN or exchange any unused pieces or pick up more pieces easily (in most cases) if there is a change in plans
• SAVE thousands by installing yourself (if you’re really ambitious)
• low cost of cabinets means you can splurge on counters and appliances
• order online or by phone for delivery anywhere
• 25 yr warranty

The LIMITATIONS:

• limited selection of door styles
• they don’t do the greatest wood (basic birch, oak)
• drawer widths limited to 30” (not a big issue)
• the Ikea logo on their appliances (a huge turnoff, who wants a retailers logo on anything?)
• the price does not include assembly/installation (add in another $1200 to $1700 for the average kitchen)
• As of this summer, kitchens purchased in store now require most parts/pieces be picked up by the customers in the self-serve warehouse!!!  Insanity!  This is a MAJOR bummer, up until recently you only had to take a written order to the cash desk and be on your way - piece of cake.  The new process now requires loading up two or three carts and lots of help to wheel your flat packed kitchen to the cashier and then the delivery desk.  And once at the cashier, the cashier has to go thru every single item (there are hundreds of pieces).  Trust me,,,,this is not fun.  I hope Ikea comes to their senses and changes this system - this makes the experience completely frustrating, physically challenging, prone to errors, and hugely time consuming for their customers and staff.  It's enough to turn many people off using this product again.

TIPS FOR MAKING YOUR IKEA KITCHEN LOOK BESPOKE:

• AVOID the catalogue look ......use only their cabinetry.  Purchase sinks, faucets, lighting, handles/knobs, appliances and kitchen furniture elsewhere or your kitchen will look like an ikea showroom display
• don’t buy their appliances with the Ikea logo on it!
• stick to classic door styles .....avoid their cabinet door styles that are uniquely ikea, stick with cabinets that are more generic and available at most kitchen supplier (ie; white flush doors, shaker style, doors with plain glass, )
• think of the base components like lego’s or building blocks to create unique layouts, the possibilities are limitless
• take advantage of their full height end panels and various size cover panels which can be cut-down and used as filler pieces, trim pieces, valances etc.
• you don’t have to order a ‘cabinet assembly’, you can order the components individually ie; just the base cabinet, or just the drawers,
• mix two or three different colours, ie; wood end panels with white doors,,,or white or wood end panels with stainless steel doors
• don't use 12" deep gables and cabinets around your fridge, enclose it fully for a truly built-in look (those black sides of your stainless steel fridge aren't meant to be seen!)
• visit the showroom as not all their cabinets or parts are shown on line or in the catalogue
• mix Ikea cabinets with freestanding furniture and shelving for an unfitted look
• if you want a cabinet colour other than what ikea offers, have your doors, end panels and cover panels custom sprayed (tips on this coming up in a future post). 
• use an experienced installer who's worked with Ikea cabinets before.

All of this being said, I’ve seen some really unappealing and poorly designed Ikea installations so like any home improvement project, the end result is only going to be as good as your design and the installation.  For the best results, hire a designer to plan your Ikea kitchen for you, no matter how much you spend on your new kitchen, it will fall short on function, style and quality without a great design plan and proper installation.  Check out my e-design website for more samples and info on affordable kitchen redesigns like Lori's kitchen shown below, seen at www.thedesignshop.ca.

Ikea Kitchen installation in progress - Kitchen design by Carol Reed via thedesignshop.ca

Photos: 1st, 3rd, and last photos by Carol Reed.