I have been learning a lot about kitchen cabinets recently.

My wife and I have a house that was built about 50 years ago. Sometime in the first 40 years the kitchen was remodeled. Cabinets, doorknobs, and fixtures were updated, and the bench top was replaced with a long, white bench that had two built-in round brass sinks. Very cool once upon a time. But last year we decided to put the house on the market and the kitchen definitely needed a more modern look and design.

So we called a friend who is a builder and he helped us think through the situation. A DIY kitchen cabinet installation was one possibility, but we realized that if we got some kitchen cabinet designs from cabinet makers and then helped our builder friend install them, it would take a lot less time than it would have for me. bill. And it doesn’t cost too much extra.

So our next step was to consider whether we wanted to build in wood or metal. There are a lot of very nice metal kitchen cabinets on the market, and in new homes, these days. But because our house is old, we chose to use wood. A quick trip to a couple of home stores gave us a variety of painted kitchen cabinets to consider, and over a couple of weeks, we gradually formed an image of our new kitchen design and color scheme.

We are finally ready. After checking measurements and colors with our friend, I ordered ready-to-install kitchen cabinets from a kit cookware retailer and within a day or two we had them waiting in our garage.

The rest was easy and fast. Together with my friend we ripped out the old cabinets and reduced the old wood and doors to firewood for the coming winter. That took a day. Assembling the cabinets from their flat packs and installing them and the workbench took another day. That’s when I saw the value in enlisting the help of our friend: he knew how to get the cabinets and bench top level and plumb with the wall slightly bowed.

Our last day was spent tidying up, watching a plumber do an hour’s worth of work on the sinks, and that night my wife and I were cooking in our new kitchen.