Wood grain on large kitchen drawers

[Roger Jensen]

Hi All,

Sorry for posting another "direction of grain" question, but I was at a friend's home for Thanksgiving who had just upgraded their kitchen cabinets and I was surprised the grain in the drawer faces was vertical. I had assumed (of course assumptions are always bad), that the grain would run horizontally in large drawers.

I am making my cabinet faces out of cherry, with 1/2 cherry ply for the drawer and door insets. Would you have the grain of the plywood horizontal or vertical in this type of cabinet? After looking at their cabinets I'm also considering an additional stile in the middle of the drawer face.

Thanks!

Roger

[Jamie Buxton]

There's a structural reason for running the grain horizontally in solid wood drawer fronts. However, if the drawer fronts are plywood, that argument doesn't apply. That makes it only a question of taste -- what you like to look at. I've run the grain vertical on drawers, to continue the grain pattern established on the doors below.

[sean m. titmas]

vertical grain direction lends itself towards modern design but it really comes down to a matter of taste and design.

they(whomever built the cabinets) also might of ordered the drawer fronts with the grain incorrectly laid out.

with your comment about adding a third stile makes me think that this cabinets style is a bit eclectic so putting the grain in a vertical direction sounds like it will fit.

[Chris Friesen]

The introduction of frame-and-panel drawer faces is a fairly recent thing, associated with metal drawer slides and applied drawer fronts on machine-made drawer boxes. Basically it's all about making it cheap and fast to manufacture.

Given that, I'd say you can do it however you like. Whatever you do, think about the grain on your rails/stiles. Typically it looks best with straight grain there and wild grain in the panels.