How to Install Kitchen Cupboards: A Step-by-Step Guide

Kitchens

Fitting your own kitchen units is very doable if you get the first two steps right. Here is the order we work in, and the mistakes that cost people a weekend.

Check the walls before you check the cupboards

Almost no wall in a real house is straight, level or square, and almost every installation problem traces back to that. Before anything comes out of a box, run a long spirit level along the floor and up the walls and find your high point and your worst bulge. If the floor drops 15 mm across a four-metre run, you need to know that now, not when the last unit refuses to line up with the first.

Set a datum line and work from it

Draw one level pencil line right around the room at the height of the top of your base units, measured up from the highest point of the floor. Every unit gets set to that line, and the gaps that result at the bottom get hidden by the plinth. This single step is the difference between a run of cupboards that reads as one clean line and one that visibly wanders.

Hang the wall units first, not the base units

It feels backwards, but fitting the wall cupboards while the floor is still clear saves a lot of awkward reaching over base units. Find the studs or use proper cavity fixings rated well above the loaded weight of the cupboard, hang the rail, and check each unit against your datum line as you go. Join neighbouring units to each other before you fully tighten them to the wall.

Level, shim and join the base units

Set each base unit on its legs, bring it up to the datum line, and pack behind it where the wall bows. Clamp adjoining units together, check the fronts are flush, then screw them to each other through the side panels. Cupboards that are joined to each other stay in line; cupboards that are only screwed to the wall drift apart over time.

Leave doors and drawers until last

Fit the carcasses, get your countertop templated, and only then hang doors and fit drawer fronts. Modern soft-close hinges adjust in three directions, so budget an unhurried hour at the end purely for adjustment. Consistent gaps between doors are what make a kitchen look professionally fitted, and they are almost entirely down to that final hour.

When it is worth handing it over

DIY makes sense for a straightforward run of units on sound walls. It makes less sense where you are cutting into a quartz top, moving plumbing or electrics, or working around an awkward corner that needs a scribed filler. Our pre-cut, pre-drilled units are built for self-assembly, and if you would rather not do the fitting, our own installers will measure, build and fit the whole kitchen for you.