Cabinets

Cabinets

Four cabinets, and the decision between them is simple once you know what it turns on: whether you want the top of the cabinet to be a surface, and what the inside has to hold.

178 cm or 159 cm

At 178 cm, Vinicole and Sirius stand above eye level for most people. The top shelf is out of comfortable reach, so it is for what you use rarely, and the piece reads as architecture against the wall — there is no usable top. In exchange you get vertical storage in a small footprint: 114 to 119 cm of wall carries what a 240 cm sideboard would. Charyton stops at 159 cm, which is at or just below eye level, so the top works as a surface for a lamp or a tray and the upper shelf inside stays within reach. Neither is better; it depends on whether the cabinet is a container or a piece of furniture you use.

Then depth, width and the base

Vinicole is the deepest at 52 cm — the difference between storing plates and storing serving dishes, files and boxes. Sirius is the narrowest at 114 cm and fits beside a chimney breast or in a short wall between two openings; tall and narrow is also the proportion that most needs the wall fixing we supply. Charyton at 124 cm is the widest and the shallowest at 49 cm, divided into four narrow doors so the swing is short. The base is the other real choice: Sirius sits on black metal, which separates and makes the cabinet appear to float; Vinicole and Charyton use metal and brass or bronze, which read warm against walnut and let the piece settle into the room.

Ritual: the interior is the decision

From outside one cabinet looks much like another. Inside, three uses need three different fit-outs. Storage wants adjustable shelves and depth; display wants fixed heights set to what goes on them; a bar wants bottle height — a 33 cm bottle will not stand under a shelf set for plates — a rack for stemware, and a surface that tolerates a spill. Ritual is specified to whichever of those it is, and if the piece may change rooms in a few years, adjustable shelving is the honest answer.

Doors and clearance

A cabinet in a corridor or beside a dining table needs the door swing checked against the walkway and against a chair that is pulled out. This is the measurement people forget and the one that cannot be fixed afterwards; where the space will not take it, we change the door arrangement.

Materials and ordering

Solid wood bodies with walnut veneer; shaped geometric door fronts cut with real relief, the same construction as the Lavor sideboard. Dimensions, finish, metal finish and the internal fit-out are specified per project. Wood pieces are typically ready in six to eight weeks. Made in our Istanbul workshop.