Kitchen build

[john hejmanowski]

I am thinking about a no frills kitchen build (which I have never done before). There is about 350 sq. ft. of cabinet face. Roughly, how much rough sawn cherry should I get? 350 BF plus 25% or 50% or what?

Thanks. John H

[Zachary Hoyt]

It depends on what kind of cabinets you're making and how bad the rough cherry is, or in other words how much of it you'll have to discard. Also how closely the dimensions of wood you need can be fitted into the lengths and widths of boards you can get. I have built an island and several cabinet fronts for our kitchen from cherry, with face frames and ply panel doors, and that means less cherry. If you're doing raised panels or some other things it would be more.

[Jim Dwight]

John,

I built one kitchen several decades ago. I built a cabinet at a time. I was doing it at night and on weekends and I had a family that needed to still use the kitchen. So I built a cabinet and then removed the existing cabinet and hung the new one. There was one long run where I couldn't do exactly that but I still got the sink and dishwasher functional after tear out in a weekend.

Depending a lot on how much you have done other than a kitchen I would build a cabinet first to see how much effort is involved. An upper is easier and takes less material than a lower. If you like the result and still think it is something you want to do, you will also know a lot more about how much material you will need. If you've already made a lot of furniture and other built ins this may not be necessary. But it still wouldn't hurt.

Jim

[Myles Moran]

I love sapwood and will incorporate any of it that's in my cherry (and walnut). 20-25% extra is my go to for buying wood - best case I end up with an extra board, worst case I end up with only enough to redo 1 or 2 parts if i mess up. If you're trying to keep it free of sapwood I'd get closer to that 50% number.

That said, when I buy wood i pick out and mark specific pieces for their grain on highly visible parts (table tops and big panels). If you're ordering sight unseen, I'd add 10-15% or so to account.

[Dan Hahr]

So you’re talking 50’ of cabinets or more? That’s a lot. But you will probably need more than 500+bf by the time you account for waste. This is assuming you will be very selective in choosing grain patterns.

Dan

[Dave Sabo]

350 sq. ft. of doors/drawer fronts is not the same thing as 350 board feet of lumber !

[Jared Sankovich]

I am thinking about a no frills kitchen build (which I have never done before). There is about 350 sq. ft. of cabinet face. Roughly, how much rough sawn cherry should I get? 350 BF plus 25% or 50% or what?

Thanks. John H

You have never built a no frills kitchen, or a kitchen?

You need to design the kitchen, then calculate out the bd footage of the parts. Not just the sqft of cabinet faces.

Or just keep buying lumber until you finish

[Gary Ragatz]

350 sq. ft. of doors/drawer fronts is not the same thing as 350 board feet of lumber !

But, assuming plywood boxes and 4/4 rough-sawn milled to 3/4" for face frames, drawer fronts and raised panel doors, it's probably not bad for a starting point, even if the drawers and doors are overlay.

[Jim Becker]

I honestly cannot tell you what quantity you need because that's very design specific. But in my opinion, with cherry (and walnut) I like to err toward the 50% uplift so I can carefully select for color and grain as I make components for a project. That's actually the start of the finishing process and can be the difference between a nice project result and one that turns heads.

I will also suggest you consider how much work you want to take on yourself vs how much you source from others for components. Building a whole kitchen requires a lot of material as well as a lot of space to store assemblies as well as for finishing. Unless you want to live in a constant state of chaos, you'll want to have all your stuff built and finished prior to ripping out existing, for example. There is also time. For something like this, for example, I buy the drawer boxes because the time and effort to make them is a big chunk of time. 'Just some things to think about...

[Kevin Jenness]

350 square feet? That's a huge kitchen. I guess if you build in a simple style you can call it "no frills", but still...

For all solid wood faces I would plan on at least 500 bd ft. of FAS cherry. Sapwood is not considered a defect in grading, so yield depends on the specific batch you get and your tolerance for sapwood as well as how picky you are about color and figure matching.

Jim makes some good points. If you are not experienced in cabinetwork it would be wise to start with a small project to test out your procedures.

[Jim Becker]

Kevin, experience absolutely can be a factor and I'm glad you stressed that. At least prototypes need done if it's a new thing but a smaller project that would use similar techniques would absolutely be a good idea. I actually did that when I tackled a gut-level kitchen renovation at our old property in 2003. The island was the prototype for the rest of the kitchen and was even usable/useful in the temporary kitchen setup when everything was ripped apart for a month.

Logistics is kinda where I went because this is going to be a "big" job and we don't really know what kind of space, etc., that the OP has to do it, in addition to the drudgery for some things.

[Jim Dwight]

An island could be a good starter too. I redid the island in our last house and happened to use cherry - and cherry plywood. We needed more space and the island was particularly wasteful in the way space was used. So I made a new one with all drawers. They were dovetailed together and everything on the outside was cherry. There were two outlets too. It was a fairly significant sized project - about like building a dresser. We got a granite slab for the top. It was only about 2x4 feet in footprint - a small island.

I see an island as a good start because it does not necessarily have to match the rest of the kitchen. The kitchen in our previous house had white cabinets - and when I was done a cherry island. You could make it and then decide how far you go. That wasn't what I did, I never planned to do that entire kitchen, we just wanted a new and better island.

[Dave Sabo]

But, assuming plywood boxes and 4/4 rough-sawn milled to 3/4" for face frames, drawer fronts and raised panel doors, it's probably not bad for a starting point, even if the drawers and doors are overlay.

Well, I suppose it’s better than a WAG.

But your rule of thumb would always leave you short on material simply because you would lose the material from the milling process. It doesn’t take in to account waste from crooked or warped boards that would yield less than 100% either. Others have mentioned defects, and sapwood tolerance that further reduce the yield.

1:1 really isn’t a very good tool.

[Gary Ragatz]

Well, I suppose it’s better than a WAG.

But your rule of thumb would always leave you short on material simply because you would lose the material from the milling process. It doesn’t take in to account waste from crooked or warped boards that would yield less than 100% either. Others have mentioned defects, and sapwood tolerance that further reduce the yield.

1:1 really isn’t a very good tool.

I buy lumber based on rough-sawn dimensions, so 350 sf of cabinet and drawer fronts milled from 4/4 rough lumber is about 350 bf (not accounting for overlays).

I didn't suggest that the OP only needs to buy 350 bf of stock, and he understands that - in his post, he asks "Roughly, how much rough sawn cherry should I get? 350 BF plus 25% or 50% or what?"

[john hejmanowski]

Gentlemen, thanks for all the thoughts and ideas. They are all appreciated.

how about finish to apply? Any best practice for cherry in a kitchen?