As subject, Built-in Wardrobe kits - Recommendations please, and any gotchas to watch out
for. I plan to buy a self-assembly kit so wondering if anyone has done a fairly recent
survey of what's available, also opinions of good/bad makes.

This is for a 4mx3.8m bedroom with chimney breast(1.36mx0.34m) in the centre of 3.8m wall,
and a bay window to it's right along the 4m wall. Ceiling is 2.6m with plaster cornice all
round.

There will be an L-shaped wardrobe to left of chimney and a single one to it's right.
Currently there is a dressing table in front the chimney breast, which will probably need
to be shifted to the bay window. I'd like to have a complete run of 'something' in front
the chimney to match in the wardrobes either side, but the difference between the depth of
the breast and a wardrobe is only about 4 to 6 inches, so I'm thinking this will have to
be either some narrow shelves, or just false doors to cover it (but I hate wasting
space!!). I imagine trying to put a 'built-in' dressing table there will be impractical,
but ideas appreciated.

On the wall opposite the chimney breast is a double bed, and the bedroom door away from
the window. I want to put bedside cupboards either side of the bed, and possibly a
high-level storage unit above it.

An alternative option is to move the bed to the chimney breast.

Phil A

At our last house we had exactly the same sort of bedroom. Although I cannot help you with kits I can tell you what I did. I used sliding mirrored doors that went across the front of the chimney breast and both alcoves, the mirrored doors had the effect of making the room look larger but each to his own other finishes could used. I lined the alcoves with melamine faced chipboard giving me a depth of 2ft for each wardrobe and that left a gap of approx. 6" between the chimney breast and doors. That space we used for things like tie & belt racks some hooks for hanging some clothes and fixed wire baskets to hold small items and SWAMBOs handbags, later we mounted a flat screen TV.

Richard

On Sat, 22 Sep 2018 14:12:42 -0700 (PDT), Tricky Dicky wrote:

At our last house we had exactly the same sort of bedroom. Although I
cannot help you with kits I can tell you what I did. I used sliding
mirrored doors that went across the front of the chimney breast and both
alcoves, the mirrored doors had the effect of making the room look larger
but each to his own other finishes could used. I lined the alcoves with
melamine faced chipboard giving me a depth of 2ft for each wardrobe and
that left a gap of approx. 6" between the chimney breast and doors. That
space we used for things like tie & belt racks some hooks for hanging some
clothes and fixed wire baskets to hold small items and SWAMBOs handbags,
later we mounted a flat screen TV.

Thanks for that, but why did you line the alcoves with melamine faced chipboard? Mine are
wallpapered and in reasonable nick.

Phil A

In message , Phil Addison
writes

Thanks for that, but why did you line the alcoves with melamine faced
chipboard? Mine are
wallpapered and in reasonable nick.

I could have written Richard's post almost word for word, except the
lining. I just painted to walls white, and that worked well, the main
benefit of the mirrors being light. The room appeared much brighter.

The interior was, as Richard says, a mixture of shelves and rails, built
to our needs and far more space efficient than stand alone wardrobes.
The only slightly tedious part was getting the doors right - exactly
vertical and sliding well, but worth the time spent. Not difficult, but
just a little time consuming.

The doors were Stanley white framed mirrors but this was 30 years ago,
so I couldn't comment on today's product, but do endorse the general
idea.
--
Graeme

Phil Addison wrote:

As subject, Built-in Wardrobe kits - Recommendations please, and any gotchas to watch out
for.

I guess with your size room three doors will not be considered.
Go for four anyway to ensure you don't have sections you can't
fully access.

Chris
--
Chris J Dixon Nottingham UK


Plant amazing Acers.

On 23/09/18 08:11, Chris J Dixon wrote:
Phil Addison wrote:

As subject, Built-in Wardrobe kits - Recommendations please, and any gotchas to watch out
for.

I guess with your size room three doors will not be considered.
Go for four anyway to ensure you don't have sections you can't
fully access.

Chris

Uk.buy-it-in is that way =


--
You can get much farther with a kind word and a gun than you can with a
kind word alone.

Al Capone

Graeme expressed precisely :
I could have written Richard's post almost word for word, except the lining.
I just painted to walls white, and that worked well, the main benefit of the
mirrors being light. The room appeared much brighter.

The interior was, as Richard says, a mixture of shelves and rails, built to
our needs and far more space efficient than stand alone wardrobes. The only
slightly tedious part was getting the doors right - exactly vertical and
sliding well, but worth the time spent. Not difficult, but just a little
time consuming.

The doors were Stanley white framed mirrors but this was 30 years ago, so I
couldn't comment on today's product, but do endorse the general idea.

...and 40 years ago, I built a full width one, 4m long/wide (6x door
panels), full height and 300mm deep. It has a wardrobes at either end,
with some very deep shelves between them. Over the top I made three
very large cupboards.

I originally made the mistake of hinging the heavy doors, but the
hinges soon broke in use. A few years ago I changed them from hinges,
to a sliding door system. All six door panels can be slide to one end
or the other, to give full access. The high level cupboard doors had a
similar problem of the hinges being over loaded, so I rebuilt those at
the same time with stronger hinges.

The slider rails are fixed along the floor and along the wardrobe top/
cupboard bottom panels. I had to devise some metal brackets to fix the
upper rail. I imported the rail system from a German supplier.

Those three massive cupboard require a step ladder to access, they are
used for the likes of Christmas decorations, luggage and spare
toasters, kettles, coffee makers. I never found a satisfactory way to
make those heavy cupboard doors (hinged along the top edge) stay open
safely, by themselves. My botch was a length of chrome tubing, inserted
between a catch on door and cupboard bottom, to prop them open as
needed.

Thanks for that, but why did you line the alcoves with melamine faced chipboard? Mine are
wallpapered and in reasonable nick.

Unlike yours the walls were in crap condition. The previous owner had built some useless cupboards into the alcoves already and removed things like skirtings in the process. By the time I had removed the existing rubbish and repositioned a couple of sockets the alcove walls were in a right state so it was simpler to line them than replastering.

Richard

In message , The Natural Philosopher
writes
On 23/09/18 08:11, Chris J Dixon wrote:
Phil Addison wrote:

As subject, Built-in Wardrobe kits - Recommendations please, and any
gotchas to watch out
for.
I guess with your size room three doors will not be considered.
Go for four anyway to ensure you don't have sections you can't
fully access.
Chris

Uk.buy-it-in is that way =

So they are but it is difficult to assess the quality and finish of flat
pack stuff from on line promotional photos.

The last wardrobes I fitted were from MFI 25 years back. Sloping
ceilings but I was able to adapt the backs.

I have a different problem now in that the cottage bedrooms have
included attic ceilings which means shaping doors to suit or having
stepped enclosures.
Lots of outlets do those. IKEA. B+Q etc. Nearest IKEA is a long hour
away but the B+Q stuff looked acceptable. Delivery timescale might be an
issue. (kitchen stuff 3 weeks)



--
Tim Lamb

On Saturday, 22 September 2018 20:11:12 UTC+1, Phil Addison wrote:
As subject, Built-in Wardrobe kits - Recommendations please, and any
gotchas to watch out for.

Standard depth wardrobes may not be quite deep enough for gentleman's jackets to hang without the shoulders crushing. Either a front-to-back rail, or an extra depth section.

Ironmongerydirect have lots of sliding door systems and also the internal basket/rail stuff.

Owain

pretended :
Standard depth wardrobes may not be quite deep enough for gentleman's jackets
to hang without the shoulders crushing. Either a front-to-back rail, or an
extra depth section.

Mine is - I made them with side to side rails, right section has full
height hanging, left side has two rails/half height for the likes of
jackets. Front to back depth is 0.3M more than adequate for even the
heaviest jackets to hang without any crushing. Despite the size and
storage ability, they always fill up :-?

On 23/09/2018 07:35, Graeme wrote:
In message , Phil Addison
writes

Thanks for that, but why did you line the alcoves with melamine faced
chipboard? Mine are
wallpapered and in reasonable nick.

I could have written Richard's post almost word for word, except the
lining.Â* I just painted to walls white, and that worked well, the main
benefit of the mirrors being light.Â* The room appeared much brighter.

The interior was, as Richard says, a mixture of shelves and rails, built
to our needs and far more space efficient than stand alone wardrobes.
The only slightly tedious part was getting the doors right - exactly
vertical and sliding well, but worth the time spent.Â* Not difficult, but
just a little time consuming.

The doors were Stanley white framed mirrors but this was 30 years ago,
so I couldn't comment on today's product, but do endorse the general idea.

Another +1 for the Stanley type sliding doors running on bottom rails.
Mine isn't across an alcove, I have two solid and two mirrored doors. I
used 18mm shuttering ply for the structural stuff for speed and economy;
once rubbed down filled and painted (with vinyl emulsion) it's only
visible with the doors open.

On Sun, 23 Sep 2018 10:35:22 +0100, Tim Lamb wrote:

In message , The Natural Philosopher
writes
On 23/09/18 08:11, Chris J Dixon wrote:
Phil Addison wrote:

As subject, Built-in Wardrobe kits - Recommendations please, and any
gotchas to watch out for.

I guess with your size room three doors will not be considered.
Go for four anyway to ensure you don't have sections you can't
fully access.
Chris

Thanks Chris, good point.

Uk.buy-it-in is that way =

So they are but it is difficult to assess the quality and finish of flat
pack stuff from on line promotional photos.

I think NP was being sarcastic. No change there then, since my last visits here a few
years ago :-(

Phil A

On Sun, 23 Sep 2018 03:05:43 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

On Saturday, 22 September 2018 20:11:12 UTC+1, Phil Addison wrote:
As subject, Built-in Wardrobe kits - Recommendations please, and any
gotchas to watch out for.

Standard depth wardrobes may not be quite deep enough for gentleman's jackets to hang without the
shoulders crushing. Either a front-to-back rail, or an extra depth section.

Ironmongerydirect have lots of sliding door systems and also the internal basket/rail stuff.

Thanks Owain, I'm aware of that need for jacket depth, but hadn't considered that kits can
constrain the depth. Something else to watch out for.

Owain