The Ultimate Cabinet Hardware Guide - How to Choose The Best Hardware for your Kitchen

Here’s the truth – selecting kitchen hardware can be daunting – there are so many options and combos to choose from. I’ve gone through my share of pain and I’m here to make your life easier and help you through the hardware decision fatigue.

That’s an actual photo of my first time at San Diego Hardware. After an hour walking the aisles my eyes started to glaze over and I lost all sense of what I wanted. I don’t want this to happen to you so read on to find out my top tips on how to select the best hardware for your kitchen…

We participated in the Fall ’21 One Room Challenge by Better Homes & Garden with the goal of transforming our kitchen in 8 weeks. We did it in 10. I managed the process from design, sourcing, purchasing materials and all the logistics with the contractors, while working full time and caring for 2 young children. There were a lot of breakdowns but also many learnings and proud moments too.

If you’re embarking on a remodel journey, I hope my content will help you navigate the complexity. Subscribe and never miss a post!

Disclosure: I only endorse things that I’ve personally used and love. There are product links in this post and for some of them, I make a small commission, at no additional charge to you. Thank you for your support.

Today I’m focusing solely on kitchen hardware and giving you the ultimate guide to make the selection process easier and stress-free.

Table of Contents

Our Hardware History

Get the Foundation Right: Choose Function + Design

A Step-By-Step Guide on How to Choose Cabinet Hardware

The Cabinet Hardware in Our Kitchen Now

Our Hardware History

Here’s some background. When we moved into our home, it had the same brushed nickel handles/pulls throughout – probably 200+ handles in the home!

Our home leaned cool with its grey walls and floors and silver hardware and fixtures. I knew that updating the paint, hardware and the pendant lights would be a simple way to give the home some warmth.

However, just as we were moving in, we experienced a painting fiasco where the painter’s tape irreversabily destroyed our grey oil stained maple floors (Provenza brand). If you’re going to paint and have oil stained hardwood floors, you need to read my Floor Transformation story to avoid this from happening to you!

This means we had to replace or refinish our floors. We chose to refinish due to convenience and affordability. Once the new floors and paint were done, we bought warm champagne glass globes (West Elm) and wishbone stools (Rove Concepts). With these 4 warm additions (paint, floor, pendant lights, chairs), the home didn’t require a change in hardware – it felt balanced and honestly I was so tired after moving into a new home with 2 young kids during the pandemic while working, that it was a relief!

Now fast forward a couple years later, we’ve completely transformed our kitchen and now have numerous types of hardware in our home including the original brushed nickel pulls.

So how did we decide? Read on…

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Get the Foundation Right: Choose Function First

There are many ways to go about selecting your cabinet hardware. Some methods lead you around in circles and take you to headache land.

I’ve found the most efficient and effective way is to first narrow down your requirements by focusing on function first and cohesive design second.

Function First

You’ll be using your kitchen hardware multiple times per day (tugging, yanking, pulling, pushing) so you want to make sure they function properly for the specific door AND also feel good when you touch them.

They should be large enough for you to comfortably maneuver with your fingers. For example, it’s not practical or proportionate to put one small knob in the middle of a wide heavy drawer. But if you use two small knobs instead, you would need to use two hands to smoothly open the drawer (unless you have some very good internal track hardware). I’ve opted out of the 2 handle combo on our heavily used kitchen drawers just for this reason.

In addition, will they be easy to clean? The more intricate the hardware with grooves and indentations, the quicker they’ll get filled with grime and dust.

For the next day or so, pay attention whenever you touch a handle, open a door, etc. Keep in mind which handles functioned and felt the best. Were they a knob or a pull? Did it depend on what type of door you opened?

Cohesive Design

Your hardware doesn’t necessarily have to match the design/style of your home but it should definitely compliment and enhance the overall feel of the space.

I could write for days about the different types of hardware styles and options. But that would make choosing harder. I want to reduce your analysis paralysis and optimize your time.

You’ve probably already scrolled Pinterest for hours already too 🙂 But have you seen this one?

Joking aside, to help narrow your design options, here are 3 simple questions:

1. Do you prefer shiny or matte?
2. Do you prefer cool or warm? I consider black neutral.
3. Do you prefer more more details or less details? How much do you want the hardware to stand out in comparison to the rest of your kitchen? The more details, the more traditional feeling. The less details, the more contemporary to modern feeling.

Here are some examples of different combinations:

Shiny, Warm, More Details

Matte, Cool, Less Details

Matte, Warm, Less Details

Shiny, Cool, More Details

Matte, Black, Less Details

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Now that you’ve set the foundation and thought about function and design, let’s get to the ….

Step-by-Step Guide on How to Choose Cabinet Hardware

1) Take photo(s) of all of your cabinets so you can see most or all of them in one shot.

2) Group the different types of doors/drawers together.

3) Think about the ideal way you’d like to use your fingers to open each type of cabinet door/drawer. For example, do you like the feel of the roundness of a knob or the hooking feeling of grasping a pull?

4) Once you’ve determined your ideal function, it’s time to narrow down to the type of hardware – knob vs pull for each type of door. I’ve got a comparison chart for you!

KNOB VS PULL COMPARISON CHART

The simplest method is to select the same hardware for everything. This works if you want a minimalist simple clean look and/or if you have a smaller space. If you’re going this route, I would go for the pull. It’s versatile and comes in different lengths to satisfy all different cabinet sizes.

But note, it could be harder to replace with new pulls in the future if you can’t find ones that have the same distance between the screw holes.

If you want a more custom look, I recommend selecting different types of hardware. How do you do that well? Match hardware to the type of door/drawer.

5) Determine the right size with two easy tips:

– Use Painters Tape and take some photos. (use the most gentle tape – you don’t want to pull of any paint or stain – as I learned from our painter’s tape fiasco on our floors!)

– Purchase individual hardware for ‘sampling‘ purposes at places where you can easily do returns. Amazon, Home Depot, Lowes were my go-to’s.

Note: If you choose pulls – the longer they are – the more space they take and therefore your eye will be drawn to it.

6) Determine the placement of your hardware. Why re-create the wheel, when I found this Guide from San Diego Hardware an insightful, quick and easy read!

Personal Tip: For symmetry – If you’re doing pulls and knobs – Match the length of the pulls with the length between the knobs.

We’ve covered A LOT – Function, Design, Style, Size & Placement. To recap:

– Focus on Function – How do you want your hardware to feel and be used?

– Cohesive Design – Shiny or Matte? Warm or Cool? More Detail or Less Detail? How much do you want your hardware to stand out in your kitchen?

– Knob Vs. Pull – All the same type of hardware or mix of both? If mixed, I like to match hardware to type of door.

– Sizing & Placement – Sample the size and placement at home first and ensure you can make easy returns.

If you follow these steps you should feel more confident on selecting your cabinet hardware!

But I still have BONUS material for you – Subscribe and I’ll send you the 10 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Bought My Cabinet Hardware.

Want to know all the details of our kitchen hardware? Read on!

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The Cabinet Hardware in Our Kitchen

Our kitchen is timelessly modern with organic Yin and Yang style. Yin and Yang is all about balance and harmony. Balancing opposing natures to create health & prosperity. Essentially it’s the idea that opposites attract – and are therefore interconnected. Beautiful dynamics are created through this juxtaposition.

Our hardware matches this Yin Yang design philosophy and I want to share all the details including why I chose them for their function and design. But first, here’s where I got them:

• Knobs: QiSun Solid Brass Knobs – 1.1 inch
• Pulls: Honey Bronze Kinney Pulls – 5 1/16 inch
• Cup Pulls – Amazon Basics Modern Finger Drawer Pull 4.41 inch

Knobs on Cabinet Doors

Function: For the cabinet doors, you open them from the inside corners, which makes perfect sense for a knob to be. I also knew I wanted round knobs somewhere in the kitchen because I LOVE how they feel. They needed to feel weighty and substantial. Our knobs are solid brass and feel heavy like a paperweight (3.5 oz).

Design: Our kitchen is timelessly modern with organic Yin and Yang style. I knew a mix of straight and curves would work well in this space. The round knobs would complement the straight lines of the Shaker cabinets and match our champagne tinted globe pendants (unfortunately no longer available at West Elm) over the island.

My knobs are ~1 inch in diameter. I prefer our hardware to lean on the smaller side and be more delicate. This is also why I prefer dainty small jewelry.

I wanted the hardware to warm up the kitchen and balance out the stainless steel and black – so opted for a brushed / satin matte finish for our knobs.

Note: If you’re selecting a matte (brushed/satin) brass know that there are a million different shades of brass so it’s likely you won’t find a perfect match if you go with different brands.

However, I was able to mix and match my hardware from different sources where you cannot tell the slight finish differences.

Cost: As you can probably tell, my favorite hardware are my satin brass knobs! They were actually the first knobs I bought as my ‘sample’ and I fell in love with them immediately and knew I would use them. Bonus was that they were super affordable – ~$2/piece! You don’t have to spend an arm and a leg on hardware to have it look great!

Details: QogriSun Solid Brass Cabinet Knobs

Rectangular Pulls on Large Shaker Drawers

Function: For the larger drawers, I prefer the sturdiness and ease of a rectangular pull. I opted for a ~5″ pull with no extra ends for your clothes to catch on.

Design: Simple clean rectangular – There is a subtle polished finish on these Honey Bronze Kinney Pulls which I love in the soft morning light. As the name suggests, the color leans more bronze than yellowish gold.

Cost: My pulls were the most expensive out of my hardware at $10/piece – which is still a steal considering you can find the same pulls at other places for $25/piece!

Detail: Honey Bronze Kinney Pulls

Cup Pulls on Small Shaker Drawers

Function: All of my top drawers are flat panel and for consistency and visual appeal, they also have all the same hardware. I chose a pull as I know these top drawers would be the most heavily used and needed something that was versatile but also lovely to touch.

Design: I wanted the top drawers to stand out and have more shape..especially since the drawer itself is one dimensional (flat). I found these Amazon Basics pulls that felt really good to the touch and had a clean simple curve. The bonus was that the color ‘Golden Champagne‘ almost exactly matched my pulls!

Cost: Affordable! ~$2.50/piece – I also bought a few extra boxes just in case.

Detail: Amazon Basics Modern Finger Drawer Pull

As you can tell, hardware is a place I think you can save money in your kitchen. And I needed 77 pieces of hardware in my kitchen! But there are other places in the kitchen where I think it’s better to splurge!

Subscribe below so you don’t miss my next post on ‘Where to Save and Splurge in Your Kitchen‘.

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Until next time….

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Questions/Comments? Ask me Anything!