Kitchens · 8 minute read
Planning a kitchen replacement
A practical order of decisions, from measuring up to the day the worktop templates.
Start with the things you cannot move
Before a single door front is chosen, find out where the waste pipe, gas supply, consumer unit and any structural wall actually are. Those four things set the realistic limits on your layout. Most kitchen plans that fall apart late fall apart because the sink was drawn somewhere the drainage will not reach.
Decide the layout, then the look
Work out the run between sink, hob and fridge, where you will actually stand, and which way doors and appliances open into the room. A kitchen that photographs well but has the oven door opening into the walkway will annoy you every day. Finishes are the easy part and can be decided later without changing the price much.
The order things happen in
Strip out, then first-fix plumbing and electrics, then plaster and any flooring that runs under the units, then units, then worktops, then second-fix and appliances, then tiling and silicone. Solid worktops are usually templated only after the units are level and fixed, which means a gap of a week or two in the middle where the kitchen is usable but not finished.
Where the money actually goes
Carcasses and doors are the visible cost, but worktops, appliances and moving services are where budgets move most. If you are trying to save, keeping the existing layout - so nothing has to be re-plumbed or re-wired - saves more than downgrading the doors.