New Kitchen

We had a Magnet kitchen fitted a few years back and it has proved to be good quality.
Company did the designs and all the complex fitting with no problems.
We didnt have to do a thing.

Our neighbours have a Wren kitchen, and it is beautiful.

He fitted it himself, as he's a perfectionist.
I do think that the fitting is key to the finished item.

Ikea is excellent value

We had a magnet kitchen fitted when first got married, we told them what we wanted, planned where to put bits and pieces, we sat back so to speak, they were great, no probs

My best advice would be to design your own kitchen, or if you need help use an architect or properly qualified interior designer who will look at your space, listen to what you say and give you an optimum layout.

When you go to kitchen suppliers they will direct you to one of their "designers" who is actually just a salesperson with very little design training.

They are usually able to use CAD systems to generate drawings but their main aim is to sell you the most expensive layout of fitted units, rather than what might be best for you. These so-called "designers" are very often paid commission.

If you employ a professional designer you can take their design to various suppliers to compare the cost of the same arrangement.

We had a Magnet kitchen fitted here some 16 years ago. They still make the same design and ours has lasted so well it could go back into the showroom and look as though it had come straight out of the factory.

We had ours from Wickes and are very pleased with it and the service in-store.
The builders were pushing us towards Howdens, and we did have a quote, but it was a lot more money and the designer ignored a lot of our requests.

Our kitchen is from Howdens. They will do the design for you and supply the units and appliances but you need to hire your own fitters. We got someone local who project managed the whole thing. Five years on it still looks like new.

We got quotes from Wren and Howdens.
A local joiner built and fitted for the same as Wren.
It’s bespoke and in solid wood.

Missfoodlove our kitchen looks very similar to yours; solid wood and bespoke too - it was supplied and fitted by a small independent shop in our village and was only slightly dearer than a Wren one. I looked at the reviews for Wren and was put off as quite a few of them were not good.

Varian, good point.
Thank you all, helpful

I desperately need a new kitchen. The current kitchen was vile when I moved in and I planned to have it changed, but gave my kitchen money to my daughter for a mortgage deposit. NOW the kitchen is not only vile but very worn. I hate it!

Whatever it's replaced with needs to be very plain. I hate anything fussy.

We had a new kitchen about 5 years ago. We bought the units etc from B&Q. They came out, measured up, sent us a plan of what it would look like free of charge. There was no obligation to have them fit it. The units were reasonably price but their fitting charge was expensive. We got a local carpenter to fit it and we love it.

Still very pleased with our Wren kitchen. Quartz worktops and very useful corner pantry. First designer was rubbish. Hardly any storage, second one was much better. He had fitted kitchens previously and even gave good advice to our fitter. Btw don’t go with Wren fitters. DD and I both felt they were out to create extra jobs eg rewiring plug sockets just fitted by qualified electrician. We had our own fitters and were pleased with finished result.
Previous kitchen was Magnet but designer was useless and managed to create row of cupboards across a doorway. Magnet were also very unhelpful with after sales service. Suspect every experience will be different. Horrible upheaval but lovely when it’s finished.

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We used Howdens for our solid wood kitchen last year and are very pleased with it. We chose our own fitter based on local recomendations from our Builder, and he was excellent, made a first class job. I much prefare a simple kitchen rather than one with lots of fitted racks and gadgets, which are often more expensive than the units themselves, and turn out to be nothing but dust harbourers and gimmicks. We do love our new deep pan draws and wide under hob unit though, so practical and easy to use, much better than trying to reach stuff out of the back of a low base cupboard, and you can easily see straight away what is actually in there.

As others have said the fitting and finish is really important. In our last house we had a difficult shaped kitchen and bought solid oak units. They had to be cut to fit the difficult spaces, by the independent fitter.
A different fitter fitted the sold beech work top. The whole kitchen looked as good as new 8 years later, when we moved.
Our new house already had a Howdens kitchen, solid painted wood, to our taste and probably about 8 years old.
My only grumble, is that the paint is chipping on the sink unit and Howdens don’t do touch up paint! I can match the colour in ordinary paint, but it looks different when applied.

B&Q and Howdens is the same company so cheaper to look at B&Q then order from Howdens.
The one extra I bought which I am so glad I did is aluminium liners for the shelves. My kitchen is now 15 years old but still looks great.

We had kitchen plans from Homebase, Wren and Wickes. Thought about their suggestions then did our own plan. Decided on Wren. Their ‘designer’ found one flaw in our plan which we were happy to change. As we were new to the area we did use their fitter and were incredibly lucky to get a good one who was thoughtful and paid great attention to detail. Seven years on the kitchen only has one small ‘dink’, totally my fault and continues to get compliments. Having said that if we refitted now with the benefit of local knowledge we would use a small, local company.

I've had new kitchens from both Wickes and IKEA and both have been excellent value for money but for sheer ingenuity of storage solutions, and guarantee of durability, IKEA wins hands down.

Taken a while, with this my first topic on here. Have plumped for Howdens, due to be fitted in November, hopefully. I’ll probably bore you all to pieces with it!

B&Q

I had an Ikea kitchen and fitted it myself (as I'm extremely fussy and wanted it millimetre perfect). I'm very pleased with the result.

Jax our Howden kitchen is five years old and looks like new. We were delighted with it and still are, and I would choose it again. We decided against wooden work surfaces, having had them in a previous kitchen, and I am too neurotic for any form of shiny stone, so our wood effect laminate is fine. We also have a lot of it so couldn’t have the most expensive kind. Hope it all goes well and that you are as happy as we are with the results.