Venecia cabinets?
Has anyone had any experience with Kraftmaids relatively new Venecia line of cabinets? They’re “euro-style” meaning more sleek and contemporary. They’re frameless (not solid wood) and seem comparable to the Ikea lline, though I like the look if the Venecia much more. There is little info about them to this point. Any input would be…
Has anyone had any experience with Kraftmaids relatively new Venecia line of cabinets? They’re “euro-style” meaning more sleek and contemporary. They’re frameless (not solid wood) and seem comparable to the Ikea lline, though I like the look if the Venecia much more. There is little info about them to this point. Any input would be recommended.
Thanks
My satin onyx Shaker style Kraftmaid Venecia kitchen is drop dead Dwell/Metropolitan Home gorgeous BUT we’re having problems with the thermofoil doors delaminating from (we think) afternoon sun for only a couple of hours maximum coming through tinted windows (but in Florida) and heat from the dishwasher and oven. Kraftmaid has replaced two doors so far and is replacing all the doors next week, confirming we have a lifetime warranty on the doors and that this should not have happened. If it continues, we’ll have to have all doors replaced with something solid black other than the Venecia doors–I can’t redo our kitchen countertops and floor and backsplashes, all of which were built around black cabinets.
I have no experience with this line, but I will tell you this. Kraftmaid is OK, just OK, for semi-custom cabinets. They WILL follow up and fix problems, but there are problems.
First, do as the above poster says, check everything when you get it and install NOTHING until you have looked at every piece of the order for completeness AND quality. For example if you don’t like the finish or there is something wrong, be there before your installer.
I got a bad kitchen from Home Depot and my contractor starting installing it before I saw everything and I hated the color of the finish and there were a lot of defective doors, either warped or with poorly applied finish. I wanted no part of this kitchen but Home Depot refused to take it back since my contractor had started installing the cabinets. This started a long very unpleasant process of making a claim to both the manufacturer and HD. HD gave me half of my money back and in the end Kraftmaid replaced the all of the doors.
Bottom line, if you decide to buy the cabinets, do so through Lowes. I bought a white thermofoil Kraftmaid kitchen through Lowes with no problems for a tenant’s apartment. The designers there are better (much higher paid usually come from Home Depot where they are paid McDonald’s wages) and they receive a bonus for each kitchen they design, making them much better.
Another thing, before you sign off on the design, have your contractor, go over measurements with a fine tooth comb. At HD, they hold you responsible for measuring mistakes, even though their guy comes out to measure. They did not measure for mouldings on the ceiling.
If you want to return a kitchen you can (prior to any installation) but you may have to battle for a “restocking fee”. Check to see what it is.
Don’t mean to scare you – many people have had great experiences with Kraftmaid, but I’d really stay away from HD.
Good luck.
We did our kitchen in Venezia cabinets last Summer. So far, I have no complaints. They are holding up well. We got them through the Cabinet Factory who were great. We got the cabinets in 6 weeks.
What other info are you looking for?
– T
We had a very good experience with our Kraftmaid order (through Home depot) we were two shelves short and they were sent within one week, a couple of the doors were delivered with cracks and new ones were delivered within a week as well. They come with a lifetime guarantee, that we needed to use when our swing out pantry hinge came loose. A Kraftmaid rep came out to our apartment to fix it again within about a week. We have since moved and are designing our new kitchen and I am considering the Venecia cabinets because of the modern look. I would think that they are a better quality than the Ikea stuff……
I bought one bathroom vanity sink base cabinet in this line. I like the look (white slab) but they finished the bottom wrong. At the very bottom, they set the front piece inside the two side support pieces instead of laying it over, so you see a bit of exposed particleboard under the cabinet on each side.
I had several problems with Kraftmaid cabinets along these lines (they all have that exposed particleboard at the bottom, and for several they framed the lip at teh top that holds the sink on the front and back instead of the sides, so the lip had to be cut to set the sink in. You would think for a standard, non custom product, they would have the assembly line down to a T, but they don’t. After refusing poorly made cabinets with errors twice, I finally gave in and accepted the replacements with their minor errors.
And if you are dealing with Lowe’s on this, don’t fall for the “sign for it even if there’s a problem, we’ll fix it later” pitch, and watch your credit cards carefully. Sometimes, when you need to swap again, they keep charging your card and, while they will fix it all in the end, it takes months of haggling with the bureaucracy there to make it happen.