Bespoke Kitchens in Mallorca: What to Know Before You Order One
Key takeaways
- Bespoke earns its cost in irregular rooms, old buildings and at the top of the market; a good fitted kitchen in a regular room is not a compromise.
- The process is longer at the front and shorter on site, because the decisions are made before anything is cut.
- Ask where the kitchen is made and who fits it; the answer sets the lead time and who comes back.
- Samples belong in the room, in its real light.
A bespoke kitchen is made for the room. Every cabinet is sized to the wall it stands on, the corner that defeats a fitted range becomes a drawer, and the materials are chosen from the board and the slab rather than from a catalogue. On Mallorca it is the answer to a finca with no two walls parallel and to a villa where the finish is the point, and it is not the answer to every kitchen.
When it earns its cost, and when it does not
A regular room with square corners and standard heights takes a fitted kitchen well, and a premium fitted range in that room is a good kitchen. Bespoke earns its cost where the room is not regular: a vaulted finca kitchen, a Palma apartment with a column in the run, a villa where the indoor and the outdoor kitchen have to read as one piece through a glass wall. It earns it again where the finish is the point, and wherever the kitchen is the centre of the house rather than a room in it.
The process
| Stage | What it settles |
|---|---|
| Survey | Every wall measured, not the room. Water, waste, power, extraction and the route in. |
| Brief | How the kitchen is used, what is kept, who cooks, what it opens onto. |
| Design | Layout, elevations and the detail of every run. This is what gets priced. |
| Samples | Timber, finishes, stone and hardware looked at in the room, in its light. |
| Making | In a workshop, on the island or off it. The long part. |
| Fitting | By the makers or fitters who work with them, and a return for the adjustments. |
Where the kitchen is made
Some bespoke kitchens are made here, in workshops that belong to the companies that fit them. Many are made on the mainland, in Germany or in Italy and fitted here. Neither is better; the difference is the lead time, the sea crossing, and who comes back when a door needs adjusting after the first summer. Ask, and ask who fits it.
The questions that separate a maker from a showroom
- Will you measure every wall, or the room?
- Where is it made, and who fits it?
- What are the carcasses made of, and what are the fronts?
- How is the corner handled?
- Can I see samples in my kitchen rather than in yours?
- Who comes back after the first summer?
The bespoke kitchens page is where the request goes; the luxury page describes what the top of the market buys.
Is a bespoke kitchen always more expensive than a fitted one?
Usually, and not always by as much as people expect at the top of the fitted market. Where it costs more, the money is in the joinery, the materials and the design. Where it does not, it is because an awkward room was going to cost a fitted kitchen a great deal of filler.
How long does it take?
Longer than fitted, because it is made rather than assembled, and on Mallorca it usually crosses by sea. Weeks of design, months of making, and a fitting that is shorter than a fitted kitchen’s because every piece already fits.
Can I design it myself?
You can brief it. The maker designs what it makes, and an architect or interior designer can sit between you and the maker on a larger project. The designers and architects page describes that route.
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