Fitted Wardrobes - High Street, Specialist or IKEA?

wdywuk

Thinking about getting new wardrobes.

What is the best option, as this is my first house?

I have been looking at high street options like Hammonds, Sharps etc (all the DIY stuff is horrible).

Are there better alternatives that anyone knows (like Howdens for Kitchens).

I've seen a lot of comments about IKEA PAX on MSE, but our rooms are not the right shape/size for them, and would leave unsighlty gaps of 20-30cm so that is out too.

I'm looking to fill up a full wall (335cm (L) x 247cm (H) x 60cm (D) ).

Suggestions/ advice welcome !!

ormus

The HomeForm Group is the UK's market-leading specialist retailer of fully fitted home improvement products through its key brands Moben, Kitchens Direct (fitted kitchens), Sharps (fitted bedrooms) and Dolphin (fitted bathrooms).

thats should be enough to tell you keep well away from the company.

alyssa_liss

ive just bought the pax tall wardrobes and faktum wall units for my room
they are great and well built i think

wdywuk

thanks all.

it is not sloping roof etc that is the problem, but that the wall is 3.3m long, so any flatpack will have approx 30cm spare.

A lot of friends have gone for fitted wardrobes, and are split on whether the extra cost was worth it, but do say that it looks nicer than free standing or flatpack as you get to use all available space.


looks some research is in order.

keystone

wdywuk wrote: »

thanks all.

it is not sloping roof etc that is the problem, but that the wall is 3.3m long, so any flatpack will have approx 30cm spare.

A lot of friends have gone for fitted wardrobes, and are split on whether the extra cost was worth it, but do say that it looks nicer than free standing or flatpack as you get to use all available space.

looks some research is in order.

The bad news is that standard "fitted" furniture products will leave you with the same "spare" space. You just won't see it because the installer will scribe an infill panel to the wall each end and it will just look fully fitted. But your hanging space will be 300mm short.

Cheers

flea72

have you looked at the Ikea pax range, as their wardrobes come in lots of different sizes, and you can usually make it up to the length you need, give or take a few cms

as already said, places like Sharps still only produce units in standard sizes, they just use infill panels to cover up the gaps, so it looks fully fitted

F

keystone

Flea

What is the real practical difference between this:

flea72 wrote: »

have you looked at the Ikea pax range, as their wardrobes come in lots of different sizes, and you can usually make it up to the length you need, give or take a few cms

and this:

as already said, places like Sharps still only produce units in standard sizes, they just use infill panels to cover up the gaps, so it looks fully fitted

They look exactly the same to me or am I missing something?.

Cheers

wdywuk

I spoke to the ikea "advisors" and he even suggested buying an extra colour-matched panel (either another cupboard but only use the one panel0 or a kitchen unit that you could use as a "cover panel".

What is wierd is that if this is such common practice, why don't IKEA just sell them, rather than making you buy another cabinet and have to chuck half of it away ???

mrsheenpearl60

They do this because they sell so much of their tat that they can just run everything through a machine and hey presto an hour later they have a billion pieces of kit. To make a different sized product would involve setting the machines up again. Oddly Ikea dont use industry standard sizes anyway which keeps you going back to them when you need to replace things. And even more oddly, if you can find a small manufacturer who can build to spec, they dont charge much more. Although many refuse to spec of ikea because its not up to much, When you start looking into what you need for the extra pennies it costs to get something good why waste time making tat? As an example i had a wardrobe made with exact sizes i needed 2 months ago and used proper carcases and fittings and it was approximately 3% more than Ikea when you took the handles and hinges etc into account, and only 29% more to use infinitely better materials. of course i knew who to go to being in this industry, which may be off topic...if anyone wants to know who to see feel free to mail me. Carol

27col

A few years ago we had two 12' runs of build-in wardrobes installed in adjacent bedrooms One was by Sharps and the other by a local company. I was agreeably surprised by the high standard of the fit by both companies. The Sharps worked out a bit more expensive. Interestingly, the Sharps fitter(self employed) was there while the owner of the local company was finishing off in the other room. They got to talking to each other and the outcome was that the local company owner offered the Sharps fitter some work for the local company. All in all quite a stress-free episode for all concerned. There was no problem filling the exact lengths of wall with very little need for in-fill panels.

ormus

the two methods are virtually identical. sharps etc use just the same basic product and then use infill panels to finish off.
main difference is that you pay a small forune to sharps, mostly in commission for their dubious salesmen.
even if you have to buy an extra cabinet from ikea/wickes/BQ ...its still far cheaper to purchase that rather than use the national ripoff cowboys.

i bought my present house with all bedrooms having built in furniture. i was told it was done by sharps (or similar).
the quality is just the same as wickes/BQ etc... god knows what it all cost the previous owner?