Ikea. Do you?

Doctor_Mike

I'm reliably informed by the lovely Mrs Robinson (Here's to you) that I will shortly be buying a new kitchen.

I have an excellent and reliable multi-skilled guy who will do all the fitting etc.

Looking over the threads, I get the general impression that IKEA are perhaps the best overall choice for the basic kitchen items, but did see one post cating doubt on their durability and favouring Wicks.

I'd appreciate any suggestions on the best outlets to put against each other in the arena.

Thanks in advance.

Tom_Jones

Go to your local Howdens mate, excellent kitchens and choice.

Nile

Hello Doctor Mike


Welcome to the MSE site.:wave:

theadore_2

howdens is very highly recommended, is it trade only though?

wickes is good, although the off the rack kitchens have very short wall units and are not the bargins they appear.

NOWSE

I tried Howdens the other week but got nowhere as they insisted that it's trade only.

Annando

I can recommend Ikea, we fitted our kitchen ourselves 2 years ago. Mind you being a designer I designed my own kitchen and sourced every single item. I checked Ikea, Magnet (Too expensive), Wickes, MFI (Rubbish), Homebase the lot... The carcasses are all the same, I think Ikea are cheaper. All the drawers are Bund, which is a german / austrian company, who are also used by Magnet.
A good thing to look for, and I know Ikea has them is pull-out baskets / wire drawers instead of shelves, they slide in and out so not only do you save your back but it is also more useful for storing things, never lose another item to the back of the cabinet! The other thing they have which is very good is the interior fittings, cuttlery trays, rubbish bins, baskets, trays, you name it they have it! They even have a new gadget which makes your doors and drawers close silently.
The delivery was excellent and the kitchen looks fab.

Howdens are trade only and more expensive than Ikea, personally I think that their kitchens look dated and have something about them that screams "Property Developer - All the same look" about them.

MikeLB

Depends how much time you have. I have spent the past year buying the units, doors and handles for my IKEA kitchen off Ebay! (People always seem to buy a surplus of these things, so you get loads of new stuff cheap when they clear out!) The worktops and all accessories like sink, taps, lighting etc all came from Wickes which was far cheaper. Okay its taken me over a year to get everything but in the end I have a brand new fitted ktichen for £800 or so, whereas IKEA wanted to charge over £2000!

Their own stuff seems durable enough to be honest, but i reckon the loss lead on the base units etc and mark up the doors, handles, worktops etc to make the money.

Tom_Jones

You can always open a trade account with Howdens, all you need is ID, proof of address and a Credit Card, you can then get a discounted rate on your purchases, on kitchen products, mine is 55 % I am a builder though.

grumbler

See some useful information in this thread: Kitchen base units.

My small DIY kitchen is from IKEA (excluding worktop and appliances) and I like it.

Stylust

We put an IKEA Kitchen in last year, we checked Magnet, even with trade discount, it was 3k, the IKEA price was £700!, the thing to do with an IKEA kitchen is take your time putting the units together, use wood glue on the dowels and let it set for a day.

Mummy_Jo

We fitted an IKEA kitchen approx 9 months ago. We checked everyone else on the market and they were the cheapest. We are happy with the quality of the units, doors etc. Some things to note though:
The units are 600mm deep (UK 550mm normally) so you have to cut holes for all pipe work etc. If your room is not exactly square corner units do not fit very well but can be cut down with a bit of careful thinking first (we had to do that).
The worktops are very very poor quality. We have lots of dents, marks, chunks already and we have laminate ones not solid wood. With how much custom made worktops cost from IKEA in our opinion you should go to a local kitchen fitter and get them to cut some for you (make sure you tell them it is for an IKEA kitchen or if you are into DIY and have a router buy a jig from screwfix and do it yourself). We have recommended IKEA to various friends but have told them NOT to buy the worktops from there as we are not impressed.