Have you seen Branch Hill Cabinets in person?
You say that you got Amish Cabinets and then you recommend not to get Amish Cabinets.
What are you really saying here?

No, she is saying that you should go right to the Amish craftsman himself to buy them. She is recommending against going through an "English" website. ("English" is what Amish call any non-Amish people.)

Ribs I think what Deja_Q was saying is that she/he got Amish cabs directly from an Amish cabinet maker who has his own shop, not from a company that re-sells Amish made cabinets. And that the company you found says that the cabinets are more expensive because of Amish-quality construction, but that this is not necessarily true (in fact, it isn't true in many cases; custom Amish cabinets seem to continually cost less based on people's experiences here).

I don't know anything about Branch Hill Cabinets so I cannot weigh in on that. I am, however, getting custom cabinets from a Mennonite/Amish cabinet maker directly from the cabinet maker, not through a third party reseller. If at all possible, depending on where you are located, that would probably be the best way to get the best cabinets possible at the best cost (as long as you do your due diligence and find a good one, of course).

I think I might take everyones advice.
Branch Hill gave me a preliminary ballpark of about $21,000. I thought this was a little high but they are very nice and well built cabinets.
My kitchen is about 15' x 20' so it's not small, but not that big either.
Can I do a lot better than this for high quality cabinets?
It would sure be nice to save some on cabinets so I can spend some on other goodies like a 48" culinarian instead of 36" or that Rachielle sink I have been admiring. Total budget is about 50-60k. If I got my budget down to under 50k I could spend some money to put new windows in my house or something else.

$21,000!!! Holy crap!

I paid $4300 for mine...all with pull out shelves on the bottom and anti-slam drawers. The quality was excellent.
check out the pics in the link in my post above.
and remember what is not shown is a 7' high pantry that is 8' long and 20 inches deep.
My cabinets at Lowe's would have run almost $17,000.

Yes get Amish cabs! Just don't pay the middleman!

It's almost worth moving back to Pennsylvania for. No, it is worth it....

We're paying a bit over $36,000 for our kitchen. This is what we're getting for it:

All wood, 3/4 plywood construction, dovetail construction, custom color, crown molding throughout, 13 ft. island, all glass uppers and panels on all appliances (there are many). All of the insides of the cabinets are custom storage inserts and blum full extension, soft close on everything.

Your $21,000 for a 15x20 kitchen is high, IMO.

It depends where you live and if you have Amish or other high quality custom cabinet makers close to or accessible to you.

Nice, beagles!

I don't understand what the area is at the top of your pic between the windows...the dropped counter area.

There aren't windows. Those are upper cabinets. Our kitchen has no windows, only in the breakfast nook :)

That's a cut-out for a farmhouse sink. There are two farmhouse sinks, one in the island and one in the perimeter.

I also realize I wasn't very clear above. That's what we are paying only for cabinets, not for counters or other things like sinks. But it still makes me think that the OP's $21,000 is high.

I think it varies so much by region, it is really hard to say. I am getting mine directly from an Amish person, and paying $16,000 for the kitchen below (although we have made some changes since these sketches were drawn). Our kitchen is small (12 x 13), but we did all base drawers, a custom raised counter, quartersawn w/o, etc. He was about 3,000 less than the other three custom cab makers and close to $6,000 less than the Shilo cabs.

I don't think your quote is that far off, actually. Maybe a little high, but not out of line. I will say that my Amish man will call me on the phone once a week, but not all will do that. He is also only 15 minutes from where I work, so I pop in occassionally too. If you have that kind of access, you could probably get them cheaper. If you don't, it may be well worth it to you to pay a middle man so you have some contact while they are being built.

In my experience with Branch Hill, communication will not be a benefit. After scheduling an appointment and driving out to Ann Arbor she gave me 10 minutes before she had to rush off. I tried following up with e-mails (none returned) and calls where she was never able to be on more than a few minutes. Her preliminary quote (after 10 minutes) was twice that of other custom cab makers. She wanted to charge me $400 to come to my house for a real quote. There are some Amish near Chelsea that I have heard good things about if that is close to you. You need to drive them to your house or you can pay a service that does the driving. Best of luck. To me finding descent contractors is the hardest part.

My mennonite cabinet maker emails and calls regularly and drives himself out to my house. It is far easier. There are Amish people working in his shop, but mennonite is just a branch-off, less conservative sect.

Hi Motodetroit,
I sent you a message. Thanks for the response. I also got a somewhat negative feeling about the lady running branch hill. The first few times I talked with her she indicated that her prices were far better than the kitchen design/build firms and big box stores. Once she gave me that ball park quote I started feeling otherwise.
If interested we found a contractor that we like so far. His name is Glen Glen (really, his first and last names are the same)

Hi everyone,

I am about to remodel my kitchen which is about 20' by 20' so fairly large I would say. I am ready to venture out and call the Amish cabinet makers direct.

Can those that has bought cabinets directly from a good Amish cabinet maker please either email me the telephone no. and names or pass me their email address?

Thank you everyone in advance

So, this thread is long out of date....But, I do have Branch Hill Joinery cabinets in my kitchen. I had them made back in 2005. They are still absolutely stunning today. My only error was in ordering too small a custom island. I got all cherry inset with large drawers, panes for sides of fridge and custom panels for dishwasher. The cost at the time was $6200 plus 1450 shipping. The only other quote I got was from Crown Pointe custom cabinetry-- their quote was 22,000 (remember these are 2005 prices). I rub them down with beeswax/oil mix about once a year. Otherwise, they have needed no maintenance.