How To Build Cabinets Around Your New Fridge

If your dreaming of making your kitchen more attractive and like the idea of extra storage, consider building cabinets around your new fridge. Building cabinets around your new fridge can completely transform your drab, cluttered kitchen into a classy, well organized room.

Materials Needed
•Flexible measuring tape
•Cabinetry or finished plywood
•Molding
•¼ inch plywood backing
•Cabinet doors and hinges, if desired
•Wood screws
•Drill
•Stain

Step 1-Measure the Space for the Refrigerator

While it might sound complicated, a refrigerator cabinet is just like any other kitchen cabinet. Start by making your cabinet 24 inches deep. It might sound shallow, but by making the cabinets closer to your refrigerator, you add more storage and make the cabinet easier to get to. If you want to use doors to cover your refrigerator, clearly the cabinet needs to be deep enough to fit the refrigerator.

Single-door refrigerators are typically 30 inches wide, and double door models are usually 36 inches wide. You need to make certain that the clearances match or are just a bit above what the refrigerator manufacturer’s recommends. You don’t want to make the fit too tight or installation and repair can be a hassle, and make actually keep your refrigerator from functioning properly.

One of those important things to do is to see where the hinges are on the doors of the refrigerator. Next measure the width of the upper cabinet to go with the width of the fridge opening.

When you have the depth of the cabinet figured out, you want to sketch out how you want your cabinet to look with the measurements. Then you want to decide how much clearance you want to have around your fridge. Most manufacturers recommend 5/4 inch to 1 inch clearance on each side. If you have an older fridge that doesn’t have cooling coils on the bottom you need to remember to create ventilation at the bottom of your cabinet.

Step 2-Choose the Wood

You’ll probably want to match the cabinet with the rest of your kitchen. You can use the same wood as the rest of your cabinets, you can do something different that offsets your current cabinets, or you can go with simple, edged plywood. You might also consider matching any crown molding you already have, or if you don’t have any currently in your kitchen you can add crown molding just to that area.

Step 3-Build the Cabinet Frame

Building the cabinet is simple. For the cabinet side panels use a 5/4 inch stock. Attach ¼ inch plywood to the back of the upper cabinet.

The fun part is putting the cabinet together. Once your refrigerator is in place, you can start building the cabinet around it. You need to make sure that you are using your level while you are building so that your cabinet is even with the wall and floor. Then you need to shim the top cabinet. Use the top of the refrigerator to make sure that the cabinet is level. Take the refrigerator out, and screw the top cabinet to the side panels from the inside of the cabinet. Then if you want you can add molding or style the cabinet any way you want to.

Step 4-Finish the Wood

Use stain or laminate that matches your other cabinets, or create a completely new and different look so that your new fridge cabinet stands out.

If you want to match cabinets, check with the manufacturer for stain or finish requirements, or to see if they have a laminate that you can use for the face of the cabinets.

Step 5-Slide the New Fridge Into Place

Last but not least, you need to put your refrigerator into the newly built cabinet. Use a large piece of laminate on the floor so that you can slide the refrigerator in without damaging anything. Then you’ll pull the laminate out while tilting the fridge.

Now you have a modern, classy looking kitchen with a lot more storage, and it took less than a day to do.