When it comes to home improvement projects, few rooms in the home get more attention than the kitchen. It’s routinely a top three choice when people go in for home renovations. There is a practical logic to that, as kitchens have slowly but surely surpassed living rooms as the gravitational center of the home. Families congregate in their kitchens. If you throw a party, as often as not, most of the action happens in the kitchen.

Yet, kitchen renovations often focus on the flooring or the appliances. Don’t get caught in that trap. New appliances can make your kitchen more functional, while new flooring is a nice touch. If you really want to give your kitchen a new look and a new feel, though, replacing the kitchen cabinets is the way to go.

Popular Kitchen Cabinet Design Ideas

Kitchen cabinet design ideas come in a couple of different flavors. Right up at the top are shape considerations. In larger kitchens, you often find L-shaped and U-shaped cabinet designs that virtually cover two or three walls in the kitchen. This design approach maximizes storage and counter space. If your kitchen has the space, you can even throw in an island to pull double duty as additional counter space or a table.

Next up in the list of design considerations is color. For a long time, homeowners favored neutral colors like gray or white in the kitchen. Now, people are experimenting with bright and vibrant colors on their cabinets, like blue, green, red, and yellow. These colors can add life to otherwise spartan space.

Finally, there is the matter of the actual cabinet style. Tastes vary, but popular choices include:

• Shaker
• Raised panel
• Slab
• Rustic
• Glass front

Many homeowners choose to coordinate cabinet styles throughout the house to match their other design elements. 

Tips for Doing the Work Yourself

Replacing cabinets is a labor-intensive project. Kitchen cabinets, especially base cabinets, are usually quite heavy. At a bare minimum, find one or two able-bodied people to help you move the cabinets when the time comes. Pro tip: do not try to remove stone countertops as a DIY project. They can weigh hundreds of pounds.

Most cabinets are secured to the walls with screws. You don’t want to take those out by hand, so get a hold of a drill driver. It will make removing the screws a much faster process. Again, make sure you have a friend or two on hand. You’ll need them there to hold the cabinet securely in place after you take out the screws. Otherwise, the cabinets may fall.

If you plan on swapping out cabinets for identical sizes, you just need to mark where the studs are so you can secure the new cabinets with screws. Watch out for molding around the upper and lower cabinets. You can usually pop those loose with a flathead screwdriver.

When to Hire a Contractor

There are times when it makes sense to hire a contractor to replace your kitchen cabinets for you. If you’re removing or installing stone countertops, you want a team of pros on the job. If you plan on moving appliances around in the kitchen, that’s also work for a contractor. Moving appliances often requires running new pipes, electrical circuits, and even natural gas lines. In those cases, it often means tearing into walls and drilling through the floor. You want that kind of work handled by people who know how to do it safely.

Plus, you need proof that a licensed professional did the work for changes to electrical systems in most places. In some homes, you also find kitchen appliances hard-wired into the electrical system. Uninstalling and reinstalling those appliances can prove tricky. It’s best left to a contractor. Not everyone has the time to tackle replacing the cabinets in their kitchen. If time means more to you than money, that’s a solid reason to hire someone for the job.