Trim & Fit

Anyone sick of hearing about the Kitchen Island yet? I’m kind of getting to the point where I’m getting sick of working on it. I had what I thought was a complete kitchen and I was able to cook and enjoy the room. Now it’s filled with tools and sawdust again and I’m getting a little tired of it. In the long run, though, the island will be better than the table, and as surprising as it sounds, the island is more Victorian. Pictures of 1890s kitchens I’ve seen had work tables in the center of the kitchen instead of a kitchen table. What’s old is new.

Anyway, regardless of the mess the island is progressing nicely. Plumbing and electrical is all hooked up and ready to go. I got the trim around the top and base to hide the nails and transition points. Doing the trim work is slow because you can’t really trim out the trim to hide any mistakes. The trim is kind of the final thing. There is a lot of back and forth between the shop and the kitchen cutting and fitting and re-cutting and re-fitting. Sometimes you are just shaving off a hairs breadth to get a nice tight fit. It is tedious but very rewarding when it comes out looking good.

I went with off-the-shelf trim instead of going to the wood shed and making my own. It was to save time but also because I could match some of the other trim in the kitchen. I used the same chair rail around the top of the island that I used to cap the bead board in the kitchen. Around the base I used two pieces of door stop with different profiles. It worked out well because I didn’t want the trim around the base to hang out too far over the legs. The bottom piece of door stop curves back in to the legs. I really like it. Around the opening to the shelves I used quarter round to make the bull-nosed corners like the walls in the kitchen have.

I also got the brackets mounted. I will take them off to paint but I like to get the holes drilled and make sure everything fits right before I commit myself to paint. The last step will be to make the bottoms for the inside of the cabinet and shelf, and then make the shelf itself. For that I will go to the wood shed. I’m thinking I’ll use more of the 1X6 T&G redwood flooring I salvaged from the kitchen.

Here’s where I’m at. It is still in a sort of semi-ugly state of construction, so use your imagination.





Base trim. Two pieces of door stop.


Chair rail for the top. This is hemlock instead of pine, so it should be a little more durable.