Knobs & Handles Installation in Vancouver
New handles are the cheapest thing you can do to a kitchen that changes how it feels. They are also unforgiving: every hole is permanent, and thirty of them slightly out of line is more noticeable than one badly chosen finish.
Standard hole spacings
Handle spacing is measured centre to centre between the fixing holes, and a handful of sizes cover most of what is sold — 96mm and 128mm dominate on modern cabinetry, with 76mm and 160mm common on drawers. Older North American cabinets often use 3 inches, which is close to but not the same as 76mm.
That near-miss matters. A 3-inch handle will not sit in 76mm holes without forcing, and forcing splits the door face. If you are replacing existing hardware, measure your current spacing before buying and tell us what it is — it is the single piece of information that decides whether this is a straightforward job.
Retrofitting over existing holes
If the new spacing matches the old, it is a straight swap and very fast. If it does not, you have three options: fill and redrill, choose handles with a backplate wide enough to cover the old holes, or move to knobs and plug the redundant hole.
Filling is only invisible on painted doors, and even then it needs the right filler and a careful touch-in. On stained or veneered fronts a filled hole always shows to some degree, which is why backplates and knobs are usually the better answer there. We will tell you which of these your doors allow before anything is drilled.
Drilling jigs and alignment
Everything gets drilled through a jig, clamped and set once, so hole thirty is in the same position relative to its door as hole one. Marking by hand and eye is what produces a kitchen where nothing is quite level with anything else — the individual error is a millimetre, and the eye reads the accumulation instantly.
We also drill from the face with a backer behind, because breakout on the inside of a door is invisible while breakout on the outside is not. On shaker doors the convention is centred on the stile for uppers and centred on the rail for drawers, but we will lay a couple out and let you look before committing.
Matching finishes across a kitchen
Finishes vary between manufacturers far more than the names suggest. Two products both called brushed nickel can differ noticeably in warmth, and matte black ranges from a true black to a soft charcoal. If you are adding to existing hardware rather than replacing all of it, buy one piece first and hold it against what you have.
Consider the tap and appliance handles at the same time — they are in the same visual field and a kitchen with three near-matching metals reads as an accident rather than a choice. Deliberately mixing two is fine; almost matching is what looks wrong.
What this costs
$290 minimum callout · $145/hr · $540 half day
Charged by time, not by task. Most lists of small jobs land between the two-hour minimum and a full day.
Materials are always separate from labour and passed on at cost. Quotes are free and written, and the full rate card is published rather than given out on request.
Common questions
Can new handles cover my old holes?
Sometimes. Handles with a wide backplate cover a surprising amount, and moving to knobs lets a single hole be plugged. Otherwise the old holes are filled and redrilled, which is invisible on painted doors and never quite invisible on stained or veneered ones. Measure your existing centre-to-centre spacing and we can tell you before you buy.
How many cabinet handles can you do in a visit?
A typical kitchen of thirty to forty pieces fits comfortably in the two-hour minimum once the jig is set — the setup is most of the work and the rest is repetition. Filling and redrilling mismatched holes is what adds real time, because the filler needs to cure before finishing.
Do you supply the hardware?
Usually better if you buy it, since the choice is aesthetic and finishes vary between makers more than the names imply. Buy a single piece first and hold it against your taps and appliances in your own light. Once you are happy, order the full set at once so it all comes from the same production run.