Well the kitchen in our house is original (1979) and is showing it's age. I refaced it back in 2000 and it has held up pretty well, but now the cabinets themselves are getting to be in pretty rough condition. as a result, it's time to replace them and perhaps upgrade just a bit. Our current kitchen is just blah!. Current kitchen is made of pressboard cabinet boxes (faceframe), oak doors, laminate countertops, and cermic tile flooring. It is very inadequate on storage and countertop space as well. New kitchen will be made with 3/4" birch plywood boxes (frameless), walnut wood, most likely solid surface countertops and not sure on the flooring (not ceramic though).
So to begin, I am going to make a kitchen island. This will help solve a bit of the previously listed problems of lack of storage and countertop space. It should also add a bit of design to the kitchen.
I am starting with the decorative back and side panels (raised panels) as I have the walnyt on hand and doing this takes up little room. You can see in the pics below, the old kitchen, the wood for the new kitchen, some of the processed wood (joined and planed) as well as the mach-up of one of the panels. The next step will be to put a little custom touch on them with a carving (design not decided yet - but something from vectric 3D is likely), sand everything and apply a cout of finish before assembly. I like finishing the panels before assembly as solid wood shrinks and at times can expose an unfinished portion of the panel if not careful. Final coat of finish will come after glue up.
You can also see what it is like machining the parts in 95 degree heat. The wood chips and dust have a tendency to stick to you