Standard counters are 25 1/2” to allow 3/4” overhang. I believe ones makes their counters even slightly deeper due to their rail. In your case you could skip the rail which would get you about 1/2” but would complicate install. Or change the counter.

OK, thanks. We bought the counters separately and they are exactly 25" (we wanted no seams in butcherblock so purchased solid butcherblock for counters instead of the IKEA counters). I think for as long as it took our contractors to install the cabinets, we'll just have to press forward with the current situation and leave the rail.

We are going to shim the counter out from the wall a bit using some of the backsplash material. That gives us an extra 1/4". Looks a bit better.

Laminate a matching 3/4" to the back of the butcher block top.

@Joseph I actually considered doing that a bit later but the contractors had already shimmed out the counter - and they're not specifically counter fabricators/installers, just general tradesmen, so I'm not sure they could have managed a straight enough cut for that to look good? Regardless, that would have been the better solution.

If you had used Ikea counters the look would have been right.. I think you are overthinking a dry bar . I have no idea why any decent contractor had a proble with Ikea install.

I'm not sure why a dry bar is any different from any other cabinet installation. I want it to look nice and professionally done, so no, I'm not going to settle for a counter that has no overhang. I also designed the entire project and sourced all the materials myself, so I have my own skin in the game. The contractor is just installing what I gave him.

If I had used IKEA counters I would have had to use two of them because they aren't long enough. Since IKEA is laminated wood, it made more sense to me to have solid wood butcherblock, which I was able to purchase in 8' and 12' lengths for my project, than have a bunch of blocks stitched together. I also had to rip the other two butcherblocks, which would have required putting the stickers or whatever on the edges of the IKEA counters. It also didn't cost me that much more (maybe $50?) to get solid butcherblock, so for me it was absolutely worth it. Maybe others would feel differently but I'm happy with the way it looks. Getting the overhang right just took a bit of problem solving.

I also never said the contractor had a problem with the install. I just said it took them a long time, which is pretty much par for the course with this project. Everything is taking a long time. As we are paying by the hour I didn't want to have them redo it to remove the rail and hang cabinets on the wall.

In-progress shot, in case you're interested in seeing what we're doing. 8' block on the dry bar, 12' block on the half wall (ripped to 22") and about 10' x 10" block on the fireplace under the TV. The remaining half of butcherblock will be used as a floating shelf at the dry bar.

Looks gorgeous.

What is the material on your wall and cabinets?

The material is black acoustic slat panels. We looked at a few places but picked these up at Wayfair. What you see is actually a knee wall and fireplace framing, not cabinets - the dry bar is the only cabinetry we are doing, which is in the back left. This is in our basement so DH got his way with the color (although I insisted on Walnut butcherblock tops). It looks really good (I was skeptical).