Howdens Kitchen

The builder (joiner) we consulted said Howdens would be our likely option based on our budget. We are having our entire kitchen gutted and replaced.

Any impressions? Reviews? Good or bad?

Any other kitchen suppliers worth looking into?

The builder (joiner) we consulted said Howdens would be our likely option based on our budget. We are having our entire kitchen gutted and replaced.

Any impressions? Reviews? Good or bad?

Any other kitchen suppliers worth looking into?

Do you guys own already?

Brits (mostly) LOVE name brands, so you’ll be paying a lot for the name.  I’ve heard mixed reviews on Howdens.

I’d travel around to several different showrooms and order several catalogues and see which suits your style.

Other suppliers are Ikea (don’t knock an ikea kitchen until you’ve seen one.  They are pretty fab), B&Q, Wickes, Magnet, Wren, and Sheraton.  I’m sure there are many more.

I think almost more important than who you buy your kitchen from is who you have it installed by.
How did you find your joiner, was it a personal recommendation? Online reviews (good or bad) for tradesmen mean less than nothing in my opinion.

I have a carpentry job pending at the moment and I had no recommendations from friends so I went to the local iron monger and co-incidentally, the local Howden's (they only sell to the trades) to see if they could give me names. I found them very helpful.

Pay extra for a decent tap.  Ours is the tap from hell and burns someone in the family at least once a week.  The difference between scalding hot and burning cold is just a few millimeters.  And if you try to change the flow, it burns you again for your trouble.

Pay extra for a decent tap.  Ours is the tap from hell and burns someone in the family at least once a week.  The difference between scalding hot and burning cold is just a few millimeters.  And if you try to change the flow, it burns you again for your trouble.

It's not one of those from the advert where the daughter drinks from the tap that 0.0001 second earlier had been producing scalding water is it? I watch that and think, that is just an accident/lawsuit waiting to happen!

Do you guys own already?

Brits (mostly) LOVE name brands, so you’ll be paying a lot for the name.  I’ve heard mixed reviews on Howdens.

I’d travel around to several different showrooms and order several catalogues and see which suits your style.

Other suppliers are Ikea (don’t knock an ikea kitchen until you’ve seen one.  They are pretty fab), B&Q, Wickes, Magnet, Wren, and Sheraton.  I’m sure there are many more.

Yes, we were quite surprised a bank approved my husband for a mortgage since he only got here on January and had no credit history. We had to put more on the downpayment (1/3) but we had been saving up for our first home anyway. 2 years ago when we didn’t think about moving to the UK yet, we thought we were saving for a house in the Bay Area (Northern California) where prices are ridiculous because of the tech industry! All I can say is thank God we got out of there!

Thanks for the recommendations! My husband’s cousin offered to drive us around this weekend to look at showrooms, Ikea included haha! I’ll put these other companies down on my list.



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Yes, we were quite surprised a bank approved my husband for a mortgage since he only got here on January and had no credit history. We had to put more on the downpayment (1/3) but we had been saving up for our first home anyway. 2 years ago when we didn’t think about moving to the UK yet, we thought we were saving for a house in the Bay Area (Northern California) where prices are ridiculous because of the tech industry! All I can say is thank God we got out of there!

Thanks for the recommendations! My husband’s cousin offered to drive us around this weekend to look at showrooms, Ikea included haha! I’ll put these other companies down on my list.



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How fabulous!  Enjoy shipping.

I do hope you have a sofa now.   

I think almost more important than who you buy your kitchen from is who you have it installed by.
How did you find your joiner, was it a personal recommendation? Online reviews (good or bad) for tradesmen mean less than nothing in my opinion.

I have a carpentry job pending at the moment and I had no recommendations from friends so I went to the local iron monger and co-incidentally, the local Howden's (they only sell to the trades) to see if they could give me names. I found them very helpful.

We found the one guy who recommended Howdens online. So far we’ve met him twice. Once when he came to measure and another time he showed us the 3D renderings of the design they came up with. He left a very good impression because he came well prepared. Seemed very professional. I’ve only seen samples of their work from pictures of their completed works on their website.

The other one my husband met in our building because coincidentally his team is also doing a complete renovation of the flat across from us. Owner is into buy and sell though so they said it will be up on the market once the renovation is done. So we got to see their work up-close. However, we’ve yet to have a formal meeting with this joiner because he recently got married. I think he said he gets back from his honeymoon on the 28th.


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I think almost more important than who you buy your kitchen from is who you have it installed by. How did you find your joiner, was it a personal recommendation? Online reviews (good or bad) for tradesmen mean less than nothing in my opinion.

THIS!  Ohmigosh!  Shortly after we moved in, we had some work done to make a start on our house.  And, oh my gawd, did they do a bad job!  We wanted a doorway moved from the end of the kitchen to the center of the wall so we could have cabinets in a C shape around the room, but the new door is off-center by over an inch because they measured from a false wall/paneling that the previous owners put in and we were still in the process of removing, so they calculated from the wrong point (which is a little, insignificant thing that nobody will ever notice, but it bugs the he|| out of my husband!).  Plus, the doorways are meant to have curves at the top corners, and all the curves they created are uneven.  And the plastering job... oh, what a mess!  After they finished it and I was checking it out, pointing out the biggest blobs and splodges, he claimed "it's not possible to have perfectly smooth plaster."  I was all, "... uh... yes!"  *points at other walls*  Plus, they flung plaster all over the place (and didn't clean it up!), and they didn't dropcloth anything, so masonry dust got into everything from when they drilled and cut through the wall to put in the new doorway.  I still find things with a layer of fine black powder on, more than a year later.

We'd found him online, where he had dozens of rave reviews.  Far more than anybody else in the area.  But the difference in quality between what we thought we were getting based on the reviews and what we actually got was huge.  We can live with the imperfections (off-center doorway, slightly uneven curves), and we will eventually need to have the plaster re-skimmed anyway, after we've finished clearing out that wall and tidying up the room, so the walls will get smoothed.  But we paid for a centered door.  We paid for curved corners in the doorways.  In the end, I think we paid just to make them go away and stop making a huge mess of my house. 

So, yeah.  Don't trust reviews.  Talk to people who've actually had work from your builder.  Maybe even ask if you can see their work.

Pay extra for a decent tap.  Ours is the tap from hell and burns someone in the family at least once a week.  The difference between scalding hot and burning cold is just a few millimeters.  And if you try to change the flow, it burns you again for your trouble.

Oh yes! The current taps we have do that too! I can never find the perfect blend of hot and cold so I end up having more cold. The poor baby tells me “mummy cold” all the time when I give him a bath.


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Howden's isn't really a *brand name* at all; they supply to the trade, and unless you know a tradesmans with an account, you can go to the showroom and look, but you can't buy.

We did a big extension in late 2015; went to B&Q, a local outfit, Wicke's and other places. Ended up with Howden's via our plumber who had an account, and my husband fitted it with some minor assistance on the long countertop cutouts.

The price was the best we found for the units, and the quality is good, especially if you are on a budget. The base cabinets are not flat-pack - but pre-assembled. You do put the door fronts on and the handles on the doors, but the basic carcass is done for you, which is a huge plus. The guy who did the design was very experienced, and I believe we got the best kitchen available for the money.

I do hope you have a sofa now.   

Still no sofa haha! We’re waiting until our renovation is complete so we don’t have to move it....... actually we’re updating the entire flat so it made more sense to wait. We got a fixer upper. The previous owner retired to Japan and wanted to sell fast. It’s not unliveable but it needs more than a deep cleaning. Think the seller said it hasn’t been updated since the 80’s (?)


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THIS!  Ohmigosh!

So sorry! It completely sucks doesn't it, when you think you've done your due diligence... 

Think the seller said it hasn’t been updated since the 80’s (?)

I wish ours hadn't been!  The previous owners bought our hows* house in about 2000-ish, and they did a lot of bad things to it.  A lot of our work will be undoing what they did.

* WTF?!  "Hows"?  What were my fingers thinking?!

Howden's isn't really a *brand name* at all; they supply to the trade, and unless you know a tradesmans with an account, you can go to the showroom and look, but you can't buy.

We did a big extension in late 2015; went to B&Q, a local outfit, Wicke's and other places. Ended up with Howden's via our plumber who had an account, and my husband fitted it with some minor assistance on the long countertop cutouts.

The price was the best we found for the units, and the quality is good, especially if you are on a budget. The base cabinets are not flat-pack - but pre-assembled. You do put the door fronts on and the handles on the doors, but the basic carcass is done for you, which is a huge plus. The guy who did the design was very experienced, and I believe we got the best kitchen available for the money.

Thanks for the review! I wish my husband was as handy so we could save on the installation. I went to the Howdens showroom to touch and feel the cabinets and they felt pretty solid to me. Just wasn’t sure about the longevity so in your experience have your cabinets been holding up pretty good since late-2015? Do you have any young children? One of my concerns is the cabinets holding up to children’s banging and scratching, etc.


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