Is inset really worth the extra cost?

Only you can decide that. Inset looks more finished and more period-correct, and it costs more because every opening has to be built to fit. If the house is old and the kitchen is meant to look like it belongs, inset is usually the right call. If budget matters more than the detail, overlay in a traditional door gives you most of the look for less.

Can I get glass in some of the doors?

Yes. Glass mullion doors are a traditional detail and we order them regularly — usually over a sink or on a few upper cabinets to break up a long run. Decide which cabinets get glass at the showroom, so the order goes in right the first time.

Will traditional cabinets look dated in ten years?

Traditional is the look that has been current for a hundred years. It reads as permanent rather than fashionable, which is exactly why people in older houses pick it. It is the safe bet if you plan to stay.

Are traditional cabinets harder to clean?

A little. Raised panels and moulding have grooves that a flat slab does not, and painted finishes show fingerprints less than dark stains. None of it is difficult — it is just not the wipe-clean surface a flat modern door is.

Classic framed cabinetry in a soft warm off-white finish

Cabinet Store · 3227 NY-22 · Patterson, NY

Traditional and Classic Kitchen Cabinets

Raised panels, crown moulding, inset doors. The look that agrees with an older house instead of arguing with it. Cabinets start at $3,000.

Who picks this, and why it is the most common choice around here.

This part of New York is full of pre-war and mid-century houses — colonials, capes, farmhouses, village houses built when a kitchen was meant to look like it belonged to the house. A flat modern slab door dropped into a 1930s colonial fights the room. The trim is different, the proportions are different, the whole house is doing something else. Traditional cabinetry is the choice that agrees with the house instead of arguing with it.

That is why it is the most common thing people walk out of the showroom having picked, especially in and around the older towns of Putnam and northern Westchester. It is not the only choice — we sell all five style families — but it is the one that fits the housing stock here without anyone having to think too hard about it.

What it looks like.

Raised-panel doors, where the center panel sits proud of the frame, and recessed-panel doors, where it sits back. Framed construction — the cabinet has a face frame, and the doors hinge to it. Inset doors, where the door sits flush inside the frame rather than overlapping it.

The details that make a kitchen read as traditional: crown moulding at the top, a light rail that hides the under-cabinet lighting, furniture-style toe kicks instead of a plain recess, glass mullion doors over the sink or on a few uppers, and beaded face frames that put a fine groove along the inside edge. None of this is required — you pick the details you want — but these are the moves that make a kitchen look like it has always been there.

Inset versus overlay — the thing nobody explains.

There are two ways a door meets a frame, and the difference changes both the look and the price. Inset is the older, costlier, more exacting method: the door sits inside the frame with a hairline reveal all around, flush with the face. Because wood moves with humidity, an inset door has to be built tight enough to clear the frame in summer and not gap in winter. That takes more time and more care, and it costs more.

Overlay is the other method: the door sits on top of the frame and covers the opening. It is simpler, it costs less, and it is what most traditional kitchens actually use. You can get a traditional look either way. The question is how much the flush, furniture-like detail of inset is worth to you.

Finishes.

Painted, stained, and glazed or distressed. Painted white and off-white are the most ordered traditional finishes we sell — by a fair margin — so say so rather than pretending every finish is equally popular. Stain shows the wood grain and reads warmer; glaze and distress add age and depth for people who want the kitchen to look settled from day one.

Hold the samples in the showroom light. A finish that looks right on a screen often reads differently in your hand, and differently again next to your countertop. Two racks of quartz samples sit in the same room, so you can carry a finish and a countertop sample around the displays together.

What it costs.

Cabinets start at $3,000. Traditional costs more than a flat slab for the same kitchen, and the reason is straightforward: more doors, more frame, more moulding, more detail to build. Raised panels and crown moulding are labor. Inset adds more still. You control the number by choosing where the detail goes — full traditional everywhere, or traditional doors with simpler trim.

Like everything we sell, these are sold and delivered — you hire your own installer, so the cabinet price is the cabinet price, separate from the labor.

What moves the number, in detail →