Advice on drawers behind doors

[Bob Cooper]

i built this case cabinet before i had built many cabinets and had to just get it done enough so that the granite guy could install his granite. Clearly should have picked hinges beforehand but i figured out a workaround that works -- i.e. it looks nice when the doors are closed.

Now i want to install 3 drawers behind these two doors -- no pulls but rather just a dip in each top so that you get put your fingers in there to pull the drawer out. I'm currently planning on the front of the drawer not having any wood applied to the box but yet have the front of the box be visible drawer front. I was also planning on using Blum blumotion undermount hardware.

My question -- will this look ok or is there a better approach. I know with Blums (which i used for the rest of the kitchen) you're going to see the hardware some and thus my question.

Here's a few pictures so you can see the flaw in my original design -- i'd never built inset door why back then and just made some assumptions -- and how i worked around it.

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[Jamie Buxton]

My question -- will this look ok or is there a better approach. I know with Blums (which i used for the rest of the kitchen) you're going to see the hardware some and thus my question.



You don't have to see the drawer slides. Consider a kitchen drawer which is overlay. That is, the show front is wider than the drawer box. In this case, you don't see the undermount slide. Now make your pullouts like that. Establish the width of drawer front you want. Make the drawer box narrower. Make spacers which attach to the cabinet sidewalls, and which hold the slides where they need to be to support that width of drawer box.

[Dave Sabo]

My question -- will this look ok or is there a better approach

It'll be fine. this is how it's done by pretty much everyone.


You don't have to see the drawer slides.

well, ya kinda do. The sides of the runners are always going to be see because they will be floating off of the sidewalls on spacer blocks. The bottoms are always concealed in the drawer bottom's recess, matters not if they are reg., interior trays, or metal Tandembox.

Bob - be sure you account for your box being able to clear the hinge at the bottom (and top if you go that high) when you determine the width of your box.

[Jim Becker]

Certain types of undermount drawer slides can be leveraged so they are not visible. You need to be careful with drawer width, especially if your door hinges and adjacent cabinetry do not allow for the opening to be fully clear. Interior drawers like this are not new and are very common for retrofit to make for easier access to stuff in the cabinets. They are not as convenient as true drawers, however, and many kitchen designs these days incorporate drawers in as many locations as possible for that reason.

[Dave Sabo]

Jim , I’m not sure what kind of slides you use , but I’ve never seen any in which the part that attaches to the cabinet sidewall is concealed.

In this instance , rollout drawers + inset doors , I can’t conceive of a way to conceal a runner that by its very nature has to hang out in the middle of the opening from a stand-off, spacer block, furring strip, or whatever.

Even if you were to choose a design in which the the door opens totally outboard of the cabinet carcass (allowing for a full width rollout ) there is absolutely no avoiding the hinge mounting plate . None.

Matters not the hinge type or manufacturer. You either have to 1. make your drawer(s) narrower to fit between the hinges , or 2. Place the drawers above or below he hinges. Both limit usability in one way or another.

[Steve Jenkins]

When I’ve done that I’ve made a box that would fit into the cabinet and mount the drawers in it. Slide in place and run a couple screws through the bottom into the cabinet bottom.

[John TenEyck]

Here's a couple I installed behind doors. I used side mounted slides and padded out the inside of the cabinet for them to attach to.

John



https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw/AL9nZEW97eCynQEVsYdqaMHDzArtObgRaKCRuUUEFHaqIeGbNV 1LRGu5WQXXfogLgAT63Sl6ZapbIyGUSk0jy1j-IEX-S-plSlTw8gfK6t3De9WmZ-iw9vtARNoaxCIB83rBVQaDBYk4lszRvdk3dPNgQrB3Qg=w1588-h893-no?authuser=1

[Bob Cooper]

thanks all. i could see attaching a face piece which hides any of the undercabinet hardware of the blums but not the sides and i'm not really sure it's worth even trying since they will be behind the doors. my plan right now is to just build them like i'd build any other drawer and have them stop just behind the back of the two doors.

My plan is to route the exact same type of recess John that you have in your picture.

[John Kananis]

Just another way of doing it but if you want to hide the existing interior, you can build an insert (wouldn't even need slides), remove the doors, install the insert and reattach the doors.