A major consideration for a surprising number of people when selecting a cabinet door style is how easy the cabinet door style is to clean. We’ve heard this question when talking to buyers in our showroom, seen the question pop up in our email inbox and have seen it asked on kitchen and bath industry forums. We’re dedicating this post to answering that question and providing you with information on the easiest cabinet door styles to clean based on our decades of experience working with kitchen designers, installers and homeowners replacing cabinet doors.
The most difficult doors to clean are the ones exposed to the most oil in the kitchen, because oil traps dust on the surface of the door and if not cleaned regularly, can become sticky and look dirty. These tend to be the upper and lower cabinets above and adjacent to to the cooktop.
Some buyers opt for two different cabinet door styles or finishes in the kitchen, one on perimeter cabinets and another on the island or one style on the uppers and another on the base cabinets. If this is the plan for your kitchen you may want to opt for an easy-to-clean design in the cooktop area and leave the more ornate design that is more prone to trapping oils and dust, in an area further away from any source of and cooking oils and steam.
Ornate applied molding cabinet doors, v-grooves on door panels, and detailed ogee and waterfall edge and panel designs are most likely to trap dust. These multi-level edges provide multiple areas for dust to settle. Square edges (shaker style cabinet doors) that are perpendicular to the floor also trap dust, but they are easy to clean with a quick swipe of a dust cloth.
An angled or bullnosed (rounded) outside edge, angled inside edge and flat panel are easiest to clean because there are less crevices to trap dirt, and dust can’t settle easily on the vertical surfaces. TaylorCraft Cabinet Door Company’s IE9 inside edge with it’s beveled edge paired with rounded OE6, OE15 or angled OE13 outside edge, along with a flat panel provide the easiest cabinet door style to clean.
TaylorCraft’s 4S 101 Shaker cabinet doors with flat panel and 3/4″, 1″ or 1.25″ frame width are another easy to clean option due to the flat back, shallow panel depth and minimal detail.
For the ultimate easy-to-clean cabinet door style, the modern, edgebanded slab door is unbeatable. Edgebanded slab veneer cabinet doors are considered 1-piece construction as opposed to traditional 5-piece frame and panel doors. The 1-piece veneered slab construction minimizes the surface area making dusting and cleaning these doors a breeze. Check out our article on how to clean cabinets and cabinet doors for cleaning tips.
