Loved my white slab cabinets! So easy to keep clean. If you're painting existing cabinets be sure you're getting it done right, by a professional who knows what they're doing and guarantees their work - not a house painter!

I don't care for the two-tone trend but that's a personal thing.

I love 2 tone but would not do it with 8 ft ceilings...you will create 2 stripes and make the space even lower.

Never. I’m on my third white kitchen. The finishes are so much better than previous years.

In my ten year old kitchen, I have touched up a bit at the seams. Nothing drastic.

I don’t understand how dirty people think any cabinets get. You dust any cabinet as you would your other furniture. Any drip such as from a coffee cup or tomato sauce, you will see right away.

I am not a fan of two tone cabinets, although a few people here have shared quite lovely ones. Just not my thing.

I have light colored cabinets in the kitchen that gets a lot of use for ten years. They do not take more maintenance than wood tone.

I love my white cabinets. My kitchen window faces NW and with a lot of trees so little sun comes in. My climate is cloudy and gloomy for many months. On a dreary December day, I like coming into the kitchen on a dark morning and seeing the white cabinets.

I personally don’t like different uppers and lowers unless the kitchen has high ceilings to balance the look.

I've had both, although I went from white to darker because of personal preferences. I get the arguments on both sides of: 1. white cabinets show all the mess and i hate it and 2. white cabinets are great and i'm a clean person and this helps me see and clean any dirt. I think there's a reasonable middle ground for a person who has a young family and simply cannot keep up with the spic and span kitchen they desire--as in, sure we'd all like to have perfectly clean kitchens but I'm chasing kids and dogs and whatever they drag in through the house and that splatter and the smudge marks will just have to wait, and in that stage of life maybe white cabinets maybe just aren't the best option. An aging in place plan suggests that kids are not going to foil your plans to keep a white kitchen clean, so unless you have beasty big dogs who will plot against you, I think you'd be fine with a white kitchen.

White cabinets are much easier to keep clean since you can see where the dirt is.

Imagine you are walking into the kitchen and drop your mug of dark coffee. The mug shatters and coffee goes everywhere. On white cabinets you will be able to see exactly where you need to wipe, but you'll only be guessing with stained cabinets or will have to wipe everything down to be sure. Now imagine you had sugar in that coffee and you will be left with sticky spots if you don't find all the splatter on the stained cabinets.

When people say that white cabinets get dirtier or are harder to keep clean, I can only imagine that they don't want to see the dirt and be forced to clean it!

I don't have white cabinets but I did choose a white countertop to make my kitchen brighter and I've always had and preferred dark countertops so they don't always "look" dirty. I've just discovered you tend to clean as you go more (something splatters, you see it and clean it then) so it's actually easier to keep things clean instead of discovering when the light is "just right" that you have more cleaning to do then you thought. I suspect white cabinets are the same.

You are right jemima, the 2 tone really works in your kitchen...but it doesn't in every 8' ceiling one. Your choices make it beautiful, not every 2 tone kitchen can pull that off.

I agree Lucky.

I so appreciate the insight.

I like the point made that with white you clean as you go and that so many of you like the white.

This is a Wisconsin kitchen on a Northwest wall so I love the idea of the white brightening it up in the winter. We have removed a wall to open the space so I now I get sun from the south and it is much brighter now. Jemimabean, your kitchen is beautiful; the quarter sawn oak is near and dear to my heart. For me though, the cabinets (all new so they will have a good finish) will run along an L shaped wall; each wall will be over 10 feet. I had covered my uppers with white tablecloths to see how it would look and couldn't put my finger on why it didn't work. I think the length is what made it look striped and lowered the ceiling. I will be going with the white and I'll upload the before and after when they are finished.

Thank you all.

Hottub, that makes good sense about the long runs looking more like stripes. As you can see, that wasn’t a concern in our...petite kitchen. :) I think that you will love the white cabinetry and am looking forward to pics of your finished kitchen!

(Lucky and Eld6161, thanks for the kind comments! It was our first kitchen remodel ever, and it was so nerve-wrecking. While we both know what we like once we’ve seen it, neither of us has a good eye or sense of design.)

We built our house in 1979 when I was but 20 years old. Coming from a big family I put in a large kitchen with an island. Islands were not popular back then and I can remember my relatives coming over saying "what?!!!?" Well I'm 64 now and happy I did that. Low ceilings, no walk-in closet or laundry room, but a big kitchen where everyone still stands around the island. I think you have a good eye Jemima ;) My 45 year old maple cabinets are moving to my husbands shop. They will look great there. Thanks again.

I have one of each. In my primary home I’ve always had white, classic, & my kitchen which was remodeled 15 years ago still looks good. Most people thinks it’s fairly new, other than a few nicks, which I’ve touched up. In my very contemporary 2d home I have clean lined darker just to break up the expanse of white walls, floors , etc. I like both, depends upon the look you’re going for your style, your location, lighting, etc. etc.

@jemimabean, what white paint color did you use for your cabinets and what brand/color are the counters? Your kitchen looks great.

When I remodeled what made the biggest difference in my kitchen was using lighter counters and backsplash.

@chispa, the cabinets are SW Snowbound and the counters are Corian in Glacier White. Thank you for the compliment! I can’t wait to get backsplash in there to finish it up. We had settled on a favorite that I absolutely loved, but the pandemic came along and made us leery about spending so much money on backsplash, so we’re back to the drawing board.

You can see the weird jutting out corner in the third photo (it’s an old chimney that can’t be taken out). I think that we are going to use the photo below for inspiration and brick it, then use white subway for the rest of the backsplash.

@crispa, oh, and Jay Rambo made the cabinets. You didn’t ask, but I can’t help but sing their praises every chance I get. They were wonderful to work with and we couldn’t come up with single complaint about the cabinets if you tried to make us.