Kitchen update #2: Island
Before we installed new light fixtures in our kitchen, we finally got around to building a real island. Apparently, about three years ago we came across an idea for an island in an Ikea catalog and made the note to one day build it. After living with a small microwave cart serving the purpose of an island for about that long, we finally made the trek to Ikea to pick up the materials for our design.
Worth noting: it's not actually finished. The butcher block countertop is very temporary. We just happened to have a bunch of it because I snagged some scraps at a garage sale last year.
The design is definitely based on that Ikea catalog, although we had to change the dimensions to fit our space. It's built from four cabinets: (2) 15"W x 15"D (one section of which is the paired wood cabinets like in the Ikea build) and (2) 24"W x 15"D. It'll be topped with a similar-to-the-Ikea-design waterfall countertop from honed white granite that we just ordered.
Backing up, on that trip to Ikea we totally scored and found two of the dark grey Voxtorp cabinet fronts and two of the Sektion cabinets in the As-Is section. The fronts new were $95 a piece. As-is they were five bucks.
Granted, we had to hack the drawer fronts. But to save a couple hundred bucks, I was down. Once we built the other two cabinets and all the drawers, it was time to install them. This required a few additional parts from Ikea to mount cabinets to the floor since obviously they weren't being hung on a wall.
It started with lots of measuring.
Then drilling the floor mounts in place. Also, coffee of course.
I started on one corner and worked my way around, leveling everything as I went. It actually didn't take very long.
To bring the wood cabinet section and the cabinet drawer fronts flush, I pulled out the wood cabinets to the depth of the fronts. After doing so, I realized the plastic leg mounts for the toe kick weren't aligned between the two. I'll need to come up with a solve for that, bleh. That notwithstanding, in relatively short order the island was installed and ready for a temporary countertop.
I aligned all the drawer fronts so they're level with each other and rest flush against the cabinet sidewalls. We had accepted not having power at the island due to the amount of effort it'd take to pull it. That is, until we decided on a whim to rip up the kitchen flooring. Then K realized that while it's torn up, I can route a cable from the outlet behind where the useless trash compactor was (we're replacing it with a pull out Ikea Sektion cabinet that will house our trash and recycle bins together) over to the side of the island. Yay!
The crew comes next week to measure the countertop specs and it'll be delivered and installed at the end of the month. So we need to get moving on the flooring…
