#1, your cabinet maker should not be asking you. He should be informing you of the + and - of the different options that he offers.

#2. Any material can be a great drawer box, if the correct construction methods are used for the material types. With #1 there, I wouldn't bet on it.

#3 If you are putting away wet items out of your DW, then you need a better DW.

Because of my time on Gardenweb, I've been a very particular customer. No doubt, that's why they're asking my preference. We've been hammering out the details of this kitchen for a few months.

We were going to go with Blum metal drawers, but there would've been a lot of wasted space as the drawer sides come in only a few sizes. We picked the drawer sizes for a reason and didn't want to redesign the drawer heights per the Blum system. Instead, he'll make full height drawers.

This is an old school cabinetmaker. He does beautiful work, lovely furniture, too. I almost responded to the email immediately, asking what they recommend. But I thought it would be prudent to check with the wise Gardenwebbers first.

Of the common drawer materials, what's the best? What did you pick and why?

Thanks again.

I wouldn't do metal or anything plasticky

We did solid wood for our drawers. Hard maple sides, cherry pin boards, 3/4" Baltic birch bottoms for stability.

I use hard maple boxes with half-blind, dovetail joinery as the standard for all cabinets. They are durable and smooth and the clean, light-colored wood just looks great. The sides are 5/8" thick and the bottoms for smaller drawers are 1/4" plywood but larger drawers or pullouts meant for heavy items have 1/2" melamine bottoms.

The reason I use the above as a standard? I've never once seen a callback for a drawer issue either in my own work, or at the company I used to work for. Some of those projects are over 10 years old.

Like JDesign, I never make drawer boxes since my supplier provides perfect drawers for half the price I would charge to do the same.

So there are plenty of options out there but hard maple is a very good choice.

I love my Blum (metal and melamine) drawers - too bad they won't work for you. I've had wood previously and never had a problem.

Thank you so much for all of the helpful feedback. I don't know whether they make their own drawers. I'll find out tomorrow what the options are.

You can get your drawers made out of anything you dream or desire. Check out Barker Cabinets or Sherr's Cabinets. They offer lines of ready to assemble cabinets. More importantly for you, one of them offers different materials. If you wanted walnut dovetail drawers and were willing to pay for them, you would get walnut.

As a consumer, I like maple. Maple is a very stable wood, not prone to warping, takes stains beautifully and is reasonably priced.

I asked what the cabinetmaker recommends. They're suggesting dovetail maple boxes with 1/2" bottoms (drawers are mostly between 24 and 36" wide). Anything I should clarify or any concerns?

Thanks!

With drawers that wide, which glides are they using, what is their weight rating,and what is the thickness of the cabinet sides? You've just added a significant amount of weight with 1/2" bottoms, and you need to make sure that they aren't using the lighter weight glides. Also, the thickness and joinery ofthe sides needs to now be sure to be upgraded as well. Extra heavy specs are really overkill, and not that impressive if the rest of the specs don't match.

I use 3/8" as a standard and have had many drawers over 36" without ever having a problem...

They're using undermount Blum glides. Do I want the extra heavy duty ones for the deep, wide drawers?

The other option is Baltic birch boxes with integral fronts. (Some of our fronts are laminate on the BB ply with exposed edges.). As maple is only a few hundred more, it seemed like the better option. But maybe not?

Thanks much.

I would definitely get heavy duty glides for any deep wide drawers, at least those you expect will hold heavy items like dishes and casseroles (not necessary for plastic containers and pot holders!). We had a non-heavy duty glide fail on a 36" dish drawer (since replaced with a heavy duty), and another poster had a 42" drawer completely fail.

Understand that the glides weight rating includes the weight of the drawer. If those are pot and pan drawers, you definitely want the heavier duty glides. However, that's over spec'd for normal drawers, and not likely to add anything to your life with the kitchen for the expense it costs. I would selectively upgrade specific drawers only.

All drawers should be individual drawer boxes, with a separate drawer head out of the cabinet face material, or am I misunderstanding what you are describing with the plywood drawers? Plywood is a perfectly serviceable material, and is also probably stronger than the drawer actually needs to be for everyday items. So much of cabinet construction these days has become about bragging rights, rather than actual engineering for the task at hand. I fully expect to see titanium drawer boxes next, or even solid cherry for some "name designer's" magazine project of the moment!

You still didn't say wether they are making the boxes themselves or not but with the Blum under-mount slides the boxes have to be constructed in a specific way. Bottom clearance, drilled and notched exactly or the slides won't work properly. I expect they know that. I think Blum's Tandembox stainless would look better with the laminate-faced exposed miuti-ply drawers but they do cost more especially their latest thin profile Legrabox line. Here's a drawer we made like the one you're referring to.

I'd do maple.

Hi,
Yeah, they're making the boxes. Jdesign, that front is lovely. Fingers crossed that mine are as lovely.

I'm leaning toward going with Baltic Birch boxes as I like the exposed edges. They can do what Kerf in Seattle does, with with face being part of the cabinet box (tried to upload a pic, and have never had trouble on GW before, so apologies for the link instead of a photo: http://kerfdesign.com/2001/01/27/drawers/)

They have tons of experience with Blum undermount, and are pricing out upgraded heavier duty hardware for my big drawers. It's an interesting cabinet shop, with an older gentleman insisting on doing things the "right way" and a younger guy who's pushing him to adopt the latest/greatest. I'm hoping to benefit from their collaboration.

Yeah, with Blum switching out their line, it got problematic. The cabinet maker was having trouble getting the parts for the old line and the new line is significantly more costly. They've made me feel better by promising full height drawers, which is tough to achieve with Blum's handful of side sizes.

Thanks again.

I think you will be fine with the birch ply sides. Re the Blum stainless you use the gallery rail system to get the sides up higher. They can be stacked to go as high as you like.

I don't know why jdesign doesn't think that local cabinet makers cannot construct boxes. All it takes is skill, patience, and time, not a ton of fancy machines.

My cabinet maker builds everything only a few blocks from me and he made me some beautiful dovetailed maple drawer boxes. They're beautiful and I haven't had a single problem. The are on the blum soft close rails.

Love the maple boxes, they are sturdy as a rock.

Never said a local cabinet maker couldn't make drawer boxes. Just addressing questions that OP raised. The way the question was phrased OP said cabinet asked OP what material to use. If cabinet maker would have said we can make them out of A,B or C and these are the different prices then that is a different question. After close to forty years doing this I think I know how drawers are made and I still wouldn't make them myself unless they are non-standard which I do all the time. I could cut a tree down and build a piece of furniture out of it also but I chose to buy the wood from somebody who already has done that.

I live beside an Amish community that has over 80 cabinet shops in a 10 mile radius and have made a living the last few years installing for several of them. I recently started a small cabinet shop also.

About half of them make their own drawers and the rest order from one of the 4 local drawer shops. None of them would consider buying drawers from a large factory because of quality concerns.

A quality drawer for high end cabinets from this area is dovetailed and sides are made from beech, maple or ash. Plywood sided drawers only go into basic, no frills cabinets.

Using 1/2" ply in the bottom instead of 1/4" only adds a couple lbs in smaller drawers and large drawers need 1/2" for strength.