what a great site- thanks for posting it

dsommerl,
Thank you for posting! This site contains valuable info on all phases of remodeling: .... recommended cabinet heights & layout; minimum bath fixture clearances; types of lighting, and a whole host of other bits of info appropriate to whole house remodeling. Check it out

Here is a link that might be useful: Good information for whole house remodel

Agreed. This site gave me some great ideas of how to fix my bedroom closet problem (view of 16' of bifold doors and no place to put a tv) without an awkward and costly addition to create a walk-in.

Oh, and I loved (and am incorporating into my kitchen plan) their idea of using a drawer bank turned 45 degrees instead of a corner cabinet.

I forwarded it to my friend with accessibility issues. I think this had more that was directly applicable than a lot of the stuff I've seen about "universal design"!

Many thanks!!

Some of his points are valid, some bogus [dishwashers should open to the side and have a slide out drip tray-- would make life simpler how?] and some just plain wrong ['Anywhere a pull-out tray is practical, a drawer is more practical': except that you can add more pullouts and rearange them without gutting your kitchen].

A lot of personal opinion masquerading as established fact.

Personally--my head is into cabinet selection at this point
I found the cabinet construction article particularily informative.
Initially I was hung up on total wood construction (plywood only---no MDF--particle board--melamine interioirs etc etc)

However, this has opened me up to these lower cost--yet apparently structurally sound alternative materials. In some repsects---they even seem superior to all plywood boxes

That looks like a site with an incredible amount of great information. I am going to take some time this afternoon to look at it. Thank you!!

Thanks so much dsommerl! The info was great, particularly the section on how to make cabinet and countertop heights fit the cook. Jama

Thank you! Thank you! I'm going to spend some time tonight looking over their advice.

Can anyone confirm the websiteÂs claim that porcelain tile and ceramic tile are equally durable and porcelain is not worth the extra cost? IÂve always heard that porcelain was much better, but I know that could be marketing, just as the website claims. Any thoughts?

nepool - I'm sure for most home applications, either of them will hold up well. I will say, last year we were cutting tiles for our powder room and our laundry room. The powder room tiles were porcelain and thinner than the laundry ceramic tiles. However, the porcelain tiles were MUCH harder / denser than the ceramic tiles. The rating on our porcelain was for commercial applications, where the ceramic may not have been.

A good installer with a solid, level subfloor (and no squeaks!) is more important than porcelain vs. ceramic. Both will break if the subfloor has give, and neither are likely to with a solid subfloor.

I think the point of the "ceramic" vs. "porcelain" thing is that it's the firing, glazing, etc., that really affect how they'll work for you, far more than how ferrous the clay is. Some of it's marketing and some of it's historical. Europeans, hundreds of years ago, were entranced by translucent Chinese porcelains (dishes), which were very white, very thin, and very strong. That's where "porcelain" initially got its cache. Check Wikipedia for an easy to understand article about porcelain.

Ceramic covers a huge breadth of materials of highly variable characteristics, and the definition of the word is pretty useless for this purpose. Some non-porcelain ceramic tiles have similar properties to porcelain. Some don't. But building materials usually have ratings, and you can almost always get a free or nominally priced sample tile to torture at your leisure. :)