[lupins4]

The Ikea person that i talked to said I will have 6 inches between the top of my fridge and the top of my cabinets. The cabinets will all be installed 3 inches higher so that they reach my 8 foot ceiling. Except, that is, for the oven cabinet, and because that is on legs she suggested using the same molding as the rest plus a piece of toe kick above it to get it to the ceiling. Any ideas how I can get the fridge to look more built in? Do you think I could also use the toe kick somehow? I forgot to ask the Ikea person and now I'm on day 7 of my 5-10 day wait for a call back since I am ordering my cabinets through home shopping

So what do you think?

[nyc_home]

I think you could use 6" high drawer fronts.

[stacylu]

I think Kathy (kmcg) has a pic of her fridge - she added a shelf to make the fridge appear more built-in...

[stacylu]

Found a pic of her fridge!

[lupins4]

Thanks for the responses! I just double-checked and the space should be about 3.6 inches, not 6. I wonder if i could just glue/nail a piece of moulding to the bottom of the 24 inch fridge cabinet? Does anyone know how wide the ikea moulding is?How wide the toe kick is? I could always buy moulding at home depot, but then I have the problem of trying to match the color (lidingo white).

[stacylu]

I think the toe kick is 4" - the roundedmolding piece is 3" (?) so one of those should fill in the space nicely. I was thinking you were going to have 9" from your first post... which is quite a bit to fill with molding!

[Neilometer]

Hey, I just noticed that Kathy's (kmcg) fridge has no space on either side of it. Does anyone, Kathy included, know if this has turned out OK? I am worried that I won't have enough room for my 15" pull out pantry because when I made my measurements, I didn't account for the "breathing space" that a fridge requires. On the installation instructions for my fridge (Amana Bottom Freezer), it says that a minimum of 1" is required on either side for proper air flow. Looking at Kathy's setup, however, I see that it looks really nice to have the fridge wedged in there like that. I am wondering if I just can't wedge mine in too. There is plenty of space behind the fridge and the air for the compressor gets sucked in from *beneath*, so as long as that's not blocked...

Thoughts, observations, opinions?

Thanks,
Neil

[kmcg]

Gulp.... I get a little nervous every time someone mentions checking the specs before trying to build in a fridge because I never checked mine. I have about 1/2" on either side, which I knew was minimal but it just kind of worked out that way. The spacing on that wall was really tight, and grew tighter as I messed around with the Lee Valley blind corner unit. This breathing space issue is part of the reason I was willing to forego the larger over-fridge cabinet. I figured that having breathing space above the fridge would help if there was any problem, which is why the shelf arrangement works well. (If anyone wants full details of the pantry installation and over-fridge arrangement, I wrote a long thing that's posted on the lessons learned section.)

So far, this seems to have worked out, and I'm so glad I did it this way. I think it gives the kitchen a custom look for a bargain price. The fridge works as it always has, and I don't feel any heat coming out of the adjacent spaces. I did resist the urge to push the fridge up against the wall in back, so maybe that's helping too. I'll keep my fingers crossed!

Kathy

[Lisa]

Kathy, what kind of fridge is that? I know my LG requires 3/8" to each side and I allowed *exactly* enough room for it...it has the same low profile doors.

I still get a little nervous because of my less than Ivy League math skills.

:::horrible vision of fridge not fitting in space and dad giving me yet another lesson on *fractions*:::

[kmcg]

Mine is a Samsung; I got it a couple years ago at Best Buy. Love the bottom freezer!