Hi, plywood with oak fronts. I want stain, he prefers to use oil base. I’m not sure of his methodology. Thank you for your help.

Dovetails are expensive old school, necessary before the invention of modern drawer slides. He'll dovetail your drawers, but he's betting you won't be willing to pay for it.

Use the money to get nicer window treatments please.

I seldom disagree with Joseph, but I my custom cabinets are dovetailed. It shouldn’t be a problem unless he is still chiseling the pins by hand. Of course, I antique hunt and dovetails on antiques are an indication of age and quality.

Customers like dovetail joints because they have been told they are very strong, and they are, but they are not the only strong drawer joint.

What we call a dovetail joint is just one of may kinds of such joints. The joint we most commonly use for drawer is the English dovetail, a joint inherited from the Brits back in Colonial times when joints were cut by hand and English dovetails were the easiest joint to cut by hand.

A different kind of dovetail called a French dovetail gets my vote for strongest joint, but you never see this on a factory cabinet in North America, and rarely on a custom-made cabinet.They are common, however, in Europe.

This joint keeps both the front and sides from moving, An English dovetail keeps the front from moving, but the is no mechanical grip on the sides and the sides can work themselves out if the glue fails.

Your cabinetmaker is probably using a joint called a locking rabbit joint, easily as robust as a dovetail joint and a lot simpler to make.

Cabinet factories still use English dovetail joints because they are simple and
fast to cut on CNC machines guided by computer instructions. But without a CNC machine, even with a jig, a small shop is going to spend a lot of time cutting English dovetails.

If you are willing to pay for the difference in time spent, I'm certain your cabinetmaker will be happy to cut the dovetails for you, but as his bid was undoubtedly based on a simpler joint, I doubt he or she will agree to change to dovetails without additional compensation. I certainly wouldn't.

Anyway, I don't think you have anything to worry about.

Any questions? We can always be found at starcraftcustombuilders.com.

Have you seen and felt this cabinet makers work before? Were you happy with the final product? Did it look nice to you and feel solid and sturdy? That’s what you should go with and let him do his job his way. There are a million correct ways to build cabinets, some are geared more towards an assembly line method and others aren’t, but a woodworker is going to prefer to do things his own, established way. My hubby designed and built all of our kitchen cabinetry and he did use dovetail joints, but that is because we like the way they look and enjoy seeing that detail each time we open a drawer. :) Buying the tools to do a job a certain way is a hefty investment, and each woodworker takes this into account.

Thank you each for sharing this helpful information and photos. I value your expertise and opinions and am learning from you! Never did I realize how much goes into cabinet making.

He is not set up to dovetail, has never had a problem with drawers holding up. — I asked to use American-made plywood. I’ve read offshore is not regulated. He said he didn’t know where to get American. I called lumber yards, and then he made a call and said he could get. He said there’s no telling what is in glues yet once oil-stained, glue would be covered. I saw photos and one set of cabinets under construction, yet could not handle them. He does not do soft close - I saw such slides at hardware store and wonder if I can add later? He uses a simple hinge, because the less parts, the less can break. He seems very practical and helpful. His price is half of the other handful quotes received, he may have less overhead. Soft close, I’ve never had, are they worth having? Thank you all again for your expertise and sharing. All of your answers are “best”!

I got new cabinets a month ago. LOVE the soft close feature on doors and drawers. Go to a showroom and see them to help decide if it is a feature that Is important to you.

Sounds to me like your cabinet maker has limited expertise.

Not having soft close would be a deal breaker for me.

Soft close is a matter of personal preference. I don't like it myself, but I have never lived with it.

I enjoy my soft close cabinets, but to me they wouldn’t be a deal breaker, it’s all in what you get used to. I asked my hubby just now if it’s fairly easy to add soft close hinges and slides after the fact, and he said in most instances it should be pretty simple. He suggested taking a slide and hinge down to a woodworking store and telling them “hey, I’d like to replace these with soft close,” and they should be able to help you and point you in the right direction. And if it can’t be done... well... you’ve lived your whole life apparently without them and I assume it’s been just fine. ;)

...and yes, I was also quite surprised at what goes into cabinet making! My hubby is an aerospace engineer by trade, though I don’t think it was just his ‘quirky engineer tendency’ towards perfectionism and tight tolerances, but watching him draw up plans for our kitchen cabinets both on paper and computer, made my head spin! It’s a lot more than just building a box and plunking it in a room. LOL!

The lack of soft-close would be a deal-breaker for me. Yes, you can add them later, but I'd be a bit concerned that your cabinetmaker doesn't do them at all. They've been around for a while and most people - not all - love them. Furthermore, adding them later is not as inexpensive or efficient as planning to use them from the get-go. Not all hardware is interchangeable. Worst-case scenario is that you use the dampers that were popular before soft-close Euro hinges and slides were widely available - again, not ideal IMO.

Like mentioned above, there is a lot to cabinetmaking. Knowing something basic, like "dovetails are strong", masks a lot of other information that you might not know. I made my own kitchen and bath cabinets, and in the process I probably had to make at least 100 decisions that affect their look and function - and that was AFTER I finalized the layout. (And I called it "fun"! LOL.)

In my opinion, craftmanship is a balance between tradition and innovation. Today I find myself reaching for hand tools more often than I dreamed I would 10 years ago.

However, I also realize that the perfect compliment to old world craftmanship is modern improvements. Modern hinges, drawer slides, and coatings are industry standards.

Your recent post has several things that would cause me concern. They may all be OK, but they certainly give me pause.

I know the quality of my plywood, I would expect most cabinetmakers to know that also, even if they don't know exactly where it comes from.

There are a number of "good enough" carpenters out there. Those guys who think any additional expense or complication has no value, who maybe think a saw blade that is a bit dull is OK because tear out is not that big a deal. There is nothing wrong with that thinking so long as it matches yours.

All kitchen drawer slides should be heavy duty and full extension to hold the weight of dishes, glass casseroles, cast iron cookware, etc. The full extension is very helpful when I am putting things away or searching for something that has migrated to the back of one of my drawers. It also prevents scuffing the front of the cabinet when i remove something. I am a little puzzled your custom cabinetmaker doesn’t provide more full size samples to handle and can’t imagine why soft close would be a problem for him. I would get a second quote from another custom cabinet maker.

"How did you even find this guy? He isn’t even a basic woodworker, much less a cabinet maker."

And how did you arrive at this interesting conclusion without every having

• Talked to the guy,
• Seen his work, or
• Knowing anything about him except what you are hearing second hand here?

that's a little sharp, IMHO.