Wow does it look fresh and beautiful! I'm in the process of planning a kitchen reno and also planning to use wood look tiles. They're such a fantastic option over higher maintenance hardwood.

Bravo, nicely done! Love the gray and white cabs with your wood look tile. They play off each other so well. Cute pendant lights!

Very nice! This is fun for us to see as we are part way into our project, and are also doing the gray Ikea bodbyn doors.

Our cabinet and install quote are very close to yours. It's doing a lot to keep the project within budget.

Really, really lovely!! It is both beautiful and calming...I love it! Congrats!

Looks great!

That looks wonderful - so bright and fresh (and organized!)

Great remodel. I really like the cabinet combo color and the pendants.

Well done! Your new kitchen is more than lovely, new and updated; it's brighter and happier looking now.

Hi dharm12! I want to personally thank you so much for sharing this amazing kitchen reveal!! I literally started crying when I saw your pictures. You see, I picked out the exact same base drawers, upper cupboards, and island, in the exact same grey and white. I also have picked a white granite (although mine might be faux), and a farmhouse sink. I've been looking at black and stainless appliances. I've been trying to figure out how I can get a floor to ceiling pantry. The only two differences between your kitchen and my dream kitchen are 1) I'd like a single bowl stainless steel farmhouse sink, and 2) I'm hoping to do a linoleum or vinyl plank floor in a greyish wood look.

The reason I started crying when I saw your beautiful kitchen is because I'd started getting really discouraged and thinking I'd never be able to pull it all together. Part of the problem is I live in the tulies (and if you knew me you'd never believe I'd choose to live more than ten minutes from a major metropolitan area, lol) and there is no IKEA nearby--the closest one is in Seattle and about a seven hour drive from here. Second, although I'm a mighty weekend warrior at heart, in reality I can do very little myself because I have severe rheumatoid arthritis, so I'm probably doubling my home renovation cost by having nearly everything done professionally.

Your pictures and story really lifted my spirits!!! I could see, literally see, that my dream kitchen is do-able, and for a reasonable cost that I can reasonably save up for! So THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for sharing!!!!! And thank you for being willing to share the cost of doing the cupboards/cabinet drawers!

I'm wondering if you could answer a few questions for me? Either on the forum, or you can email me. What was the total cost, including appliances, floor, everything, of your kitchen remodel? What did you do yourself and what did you have professionally installed? Looking back, is there anything you'd do differently? Could this remodel be done in stages? Luckily, I do have HD and Lowes nearby. And Sears. Would it be worth it for me and my daughter to take a road trip over to Seattle to visit the IKEA for design help? My daughter says we need to go visit our family anyway. May I contact you when I actually start the remodel if I need help/advice?

Again, thank you! You have no idea how much your reveal meant to me.

For design help, Debbie, I really think you're going to get more thoughtful, personalized help here at GW than at Ikea. Their design service is more geared to ensuring that you have ordered everything you need, like filler, panels, etc., and not so much to ensure that you have a functional and aesthetically pleasing layout. Could you start a design in the Ikea planner and then share it here for the layout gurus to assist you?

Debbie,

Your best bet is to play with the IKEA planner online, save it and then share it on GW here for our awesome GWers to help adjust. Visiting IKEA is more for checking out all the little details so you can figure out what you like to incorporate into your kitchen cabinets.

Hi Debbie,

Thank you for the kind words! Timeline was 5 days from demo to countertop measurements. Then wait a week for countertops, then 1 day final backsplash install, sink install, appliance install, plumbing install, final touchups. You are free to add up the values of the items listed above and add in your local labor costs to get a rough estimate. I agree with everyone else up here that you should really have a plan ready when you go to IKEA. They will look at the plan and tell you if there is anything grossly wrong with it. People here on GW will be better able to help you to get you ready to go to IKEA for final selection and delivery. The IKEA planner takes a little getting used to but once you have it working, it is really like putting a jigsaw puzzle together with cabinets, appliances, etc.

Beautiful, very similar to what I have picked out. Tell me more about which cabs were used for your microwave stack. In my planner, I currently have that set up with a counter top on a microwave base and a one door upper. But I like yours as one "solid" built in look too.

Terri_PacNW The cabinet I used is linked below. I just changed the doors above to the glass doors. I also have an inner drawer inside the top drawer. (the drawer within a drawer that is available in the Sektion line.) The opening was just a little too big for the microwave trim kit, so I bought white MDF board from HD and had it cut to size and installed it into the top and bottom of the microwave opening, which turned out to be just perfect. http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/S79045557/#/S39045601

Hi dharm12. Thank you for sharing your kitchen reno journey!

I see that you removed your soffits. Since I'm also looking a similar soffit removal (on my other thread :) ), may I ask what was your cost for the contractor labor to repair the ceiling ?

I plan to do the demolition myself, but I'm not sure yet if the repair is within my skillset.

Many thanks!

Awesome transformation! I am so impressed with this reveal, as well as a couple other recent ikea kitchen reveals lately. I love the subtle two tone grey and white.

Hi dharm12 and everybody! Thank you all for your kind words and advice. I will definitely take your advice, do the plan on the IKEA site, then come to you for advice! After looking some more at your kitchen, dharm12, and some IKEA kitchen remodels on Houzz, I've changed my mind about the sink--definitely going with the IKEA white farmhouse sink, rather than stainless. I do love the new SEKTION line; it's like playing with Legos! You can build anything you want, and the only limit is your imagination (well, and your budget). Thanks again, and I'll be getting to work on the design pronto! :-)

Thanks for the info. I figured as much.

I just showed hubby your pics. I've been trying to get him on board with the gray bodbyn...and white uppers, white subway. Your kitchen just showed him my vision in real life.

Debbie B. I live 3 hours north of Seattle Ikea (since its not really in Seattle.) However, I am thinking about using the Portland one. (Save sales tax.)

We haven't decided on whats the best option, delivery, borrow a trailer and pick up. Or even rent a uhual.....

We will likely do it in quadrants of kitchen now. Our saved funding went to something else and took the do it all at one time away.

Mal - I only had 1 vent pipe in the soffit which was rerouted in like 15 minutes. There were a few wires that were moved up too. I don't know the exact amount because it was lumped with other demo and drywall work elsewhere in the house. I would think it was only a few hundred at max plus material. ($300-500ish total). They just ripped it out, rerouted, then drywall and spackle.

Terri_PacNW - For us, sales tax is determined based on where the items are being delivered to. Unless you walk them out of the store yourself and U-haul them, at which point you pay the sales tax based on the location of IKEA. Just call them to make sure. Delivery is by far the easiest (sans any sales tax savings). Our delivery was $99 for EVERYTHING. Those subway tiles are from Lowes, $0.77 each. They match the bodbyn off-white very closely.

Terri, I live farther from Seattle than you do so I'm guessing that I also live farther from the distribution warehouse. About 1.5 years ago, I pulled the trigger on ordering an Ikea kitchen for my remodel before I discovered GW and realized how bad my layout was. I did it to get in on the last Akurum sale. IIRC, my order was for about 22 cabinets, both uppers and lowers. I also ordered Ikea sinks and faucets. Shipping costs were about $215, give or take a couple bucks. When I cancelled, I had to eat the shipping costs but in the end it was worth it because I'm going to have a much better kitchen.

I don't know what all you're planning on buying for your kitchen but I seriously doubt the sales tax savings will be worth the extra aggravation. If you order online, you then talk with a kitchen specialist via phone who goes over the order with you to ensure you've ordered everything correctly and haven't missed some filler pieces or end pieces or anything. The one I worked with also tweaked my order so that things were ordered a bit differently which saved me about $200. I don't recall the details.

Ordering it this way saved me my driving time, the time to order in-store, stand in the long check-out line, energy and stress on our backs to load it into a truck, then unload it again when we got home. And the fees for the moving van we would have had to rent and the extra gas. And I bet a chiropractor visit (or several), too. Instead I could do it from my comfy chair, shipping coffee, in my pajamas.

I've had Ikea deliveries a few other times and they are great. They bring it into whatever room you want it. They have been very polite and very careful and take extra care to maneuver around things so they don't bonk, dent or scratch your walls, doorframes or furniture.

Unless what I want is something you can't order online, I will never spend the $$ driving a bigger, gas-hog vehicle to go to Ikea for bigger items ever again. Of course, I do still like to drive my little gas-sipper there once in awhile and shop around, buying things that will fit in my car.

I advise you to fill out your order online so you can find out what the shipping will be. You can get that info before placing the actual order. And then pencil out the difference between using their shipping or schlepping it yourself.

Funkycamper is right. In Washington, the sales tax is charged based on where it is delivered to, if the company you are ordering from has a business in the state. It won't matter if you order from Portland or Tukwila unless, as Funky says, you are personally taking it out the door with you. I suspect, you'll spend as much or more in renting the uhaul, gas, and insurance (not to mention time and aggravation) if you do the work to carry out of Portland v have Tukwila deliver to your location...esp considering MOST of WA has a lower tax rate than Tukwila/King Co... Good luck!

Also, if you drive to Portland to transport it yourself and you drop a box while loading/unloading, the damage is on you. If you have it delivered, the damage is on them.

Hi, dharm12, and amazing transformation. I was wondering about the details of the trash pullout cabinet, the size of the cabinet and the trash bin. Did you use the pullout from ikea? Thanks.

What a beautiful transformation. Love it all I am especially interested in the counter tops. Are you happy with the counters so far? I am looking at using this in my master bath remodel.

naspates - I just bought a 12" base cabinet with a wire pullout, which pulls out 3/4 of the way. Take the wire racks and move them both to the bottom, one on top of the other. The IKEA trashcan with lid fits *just* perfectly on wire rack and into the cabinet opening. Even the IKEA designer was like WHOAAA when I showed him.

likewhatyoudo - I am very much enjoying the countertops. We have been using them for 4 months now, and no complaints whatsoever. They clean up super easy and no scratches, burn marks...anything really. We use our kitchen every single day (okay, maybe we've ordered out like 4 times this year), and use a lot of spices that are known to leave color. Everything comes right up with any all-purpose cleaner. They are MSI Q Quartz, color cararra grigio, a chalky white with grey veining.

Fantastic kitchen! Thank you for sharing your pricing; so helpful!

Thank you so much for taking the time and sharing your experience. It's so helpful to those of us contemplating IKEA cabinets. I'm still undecided between the gray or the white Bodbyn, but your combo looks great and I love the tile floor, counter and sink. How do you like the sink, by the way? I know it's new for you, but my concern with the sink is scratching and chipping. Do you think that's going to be a problem down the road?

I did have a question about the built-in microwave. Could you tell me if it's the single microwave built-in cabinet from Ikea that you used or are they separate upper and lower cabinets with an opening left just for the microwave?

Thanks again! It looks great.

Outstanding! This shows that thoughtful design and good clean install can have the Ikea line look just as high end as any other cabinet. And frankly - what intrigues me, is that in 10 year - and you are bored or want something different - you an just replace the doors and some other panels and presto - new kitchen!!!!

You did an outstanding job - and thank you for sharing costs - that is really helpful!

I'd love to see more pics of the trash pullout, as I'm working on that project myself just now.

I love all that nifty storage and layout -- and I notice you have some of Mom's great Corningware in one of your uppers.... And that floor is wonderful. Oh, yes, do show us more detail on the trash pullout? I'll be getting one of some sort or another.

4everdiy It is the single microwave built-in cabinet from Ikea. We had to add some fillers to the top and bottom of the opening to get the exact opening dimensions for the trim kit, but that is dependent on the trim kit. The sink so far is great. You get scuff marks here and there but they come up with any bleach cleaner. The sink is HUGE. Two people can comfortably stand in front of the sink. One washing and one rinsing in each bowl. In the past 4 months, we haven't had any scratches or chips. We cook meals everyday and wash everything by hand most nights.

artemis_ma The corningware/corelle is indestructible!! Im sick and tired of seeing the pattern but don't have the heart to throw away perfectly good stuff. It is 20 years old and is our daily dinnerware. We have broken 1 bowl in those 20 years.

I'll post pictures of the trash soon, but in words: I just bought a 12" base cabinet with a wire pullout (both IKEA). Take the wire racks and move them BOTH to the bottom, one on top of the other. The IKEA trashcan with lid fits *just* perfectly on wire rack and into the cabinet opening. This is great for those who can only fit a 12 inch base cabinet and want a concealed trash.

You kitchen looks great! I was at the Toronto IKEA last month but was underwhelmed. Way too large of a gap between cabinet doors revealing the white interiors, light rails improperly screwed in and many other issues.

From your kitchen it seems like it's just an installation issue for that particular Ikea! Major props for the trashcan "hack". But why do need to stack the 2 wire racks instead of just using one?

Spotting the aluminum pressure cooker and steel thalis leads me to believe you might be a South Asian household? I don't mean to offend but was curious how your white upper cabinets are holding up to the normal South Asian cooking? I periodically gloss over the white cabinet kitchen reveals here but don't seriously consider white cabinets...

Hi dharm12, I've been looking at your beautiful reveal again! I have a question for you and crl_, or anyone who has had IKEA cabinets professionally installed. Did the price you paid include assembling the cabinets or just hanging them? Thanks again for your reveal before and after pics! Your kitchen is warm and inviting. :-)

avocadogirl - Thanks! I stack them so the trashcan sits higher in the cabinet, no other reason. The installation is KEY with Ikea. And yes, you have assumed right with the south asian household! The kitchen truly holds up nicely with DAILY Indian cooking. We were afraid the white would get way too dirty. So besides aesthetics, that is why we did the grey lowers, to conceal the possible mess. But after living with a white uppers kitchen, I wouldn't hesitate for an all white kitchen. Honestly, any mess you make, you instantly see and clean up. It just becomes part of habit, not necessarily extra work. Second, GET A POWERFUL RANGEHOOD. Indian food has lots of splatter, grease smoke, smells and aroma. The range hood is key so that all of that doesn't get on your cabinets. We can literally see all the grease on our range hood grates. We just pop them in the dishwasher, and they are clean as can be.

Debbie B. - the price includes assembly and install. It comes out to roughly $99 per cabinet, plus $400-700 for panels, molding, and any hacks. I would use that as your rough, rough estimate.

I love your kitchen! Can you tell me what you used for the base molding around the island? Is that a piece IKEA sells or did you buy your own molding and color match the paint? If it was a paint match, was it a custom match or did you find a standard color? Thanks.

It looks great. Man, I miss our IKEA kitchen.

This is nice!

numbersjunkie that is just standard baseboard trim from Home Depot painted with a custom paint match with BM Regal Select Eggshell finish paint. I just took one of the drawer fronts in. It was then scribed to the floor and cabinet by our installer.

Your kitchen looks great!!! How do you like your double oven range? Would you recommend it?

Terrific solution with the 12" cabinet, wire racks and waste bin. Would that be the largest 52L bin or the 36L one which is the same height but not as deep?

Farnham Freeman I believe that is the 36L. Not as deep one.

thank you for posting this!! beautiful transformation! I am in the middle of our kitchen install and was trying to find a "hack" for the 12" pull-out base cabinet since the IKEA waste bin didn't seem to fit. Now i see you made it work by stacking both wire baskets on top of each other. genius! thank you!!! :)

Thanks for posting your reveal. This is very close to what I was imagining (as Debbie B says) and it is so helpful to see a real-life transformation. I've bookmarked the thread and will be back.

Installing IKEA kitchen currently and saw your hack for 12" cabinet with trash can. Have been trying to solve this problem for months. However, I can't find the wire basket pull out on the IKEA site. Do you know if they still carry it? Perfect solution, now I need to know what to buy!

Very nice. I really like the cabinet color combination. Enjoy your new space!

Krista G I cannot seem to find it online myself. The closest thing I can find is this: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/S39214793/#/S39214793

Thank you for sharing! I'm considering Ikea Sektion for my kitchen. I may steal your kitchen. :)

Love your new kitchen! Those grey cabinets with white make it really light and a farmhouse sink is one of my favorites! I have found that IKEA really isn't that bad for some things and it really can save you some money. As for the costs there is a free Home Renovation Estimator that can help anyone estimate home renovation costs.

Thanks so much for the pictures. Can you please tell me what your counter overhang width is for your island and whether or not you used supports? Your kitchen is gorgeous!

Would you mind posting a photo of the side of unit housing the oven and the side of the cabinet where the run ends? I'd like to see how you did the side panels.