Gap Between the Top of a Kitchen Wall Cabinet and the Bottom of the Soffit

[Rich Engelhardt]

I'm on board the remove and/or repair bus also!

[Eric Anderson]

When I redid my kitchen, I also removed the soffit. In my kitchen they were there so the builder could use shorter cabinets and not have to pay for 42" uppers, no wiring, not HVAC, no nothing. Now I love my higher cabs (I also build my lowers so they are 39" in height. Reaching things on the top shelf is easy, but I'm 6'6". for my wife, not as much, but all she has to do is call the human step ladder

[Bob Deroeck]

Hi,

Thanks for all the thoughtful responses. Some more information. The soffits all hold recessed lighting, so I'm hesitant to eliminate them or do major surgury. Also, I have a large pantry adjacent to the kitchen with lots of cabinet space in the pantry, so maximising cabinet space in the wall cabinets in the kitchen is not a priority.

I like the idea of modifying the existing soffits to eliminate the slope. I'll have to wait until I take down the current wall cabinets before I get a full picture of what is required. Some ripped and tapered 2 x stock, some thin drywall. and some plaster to cover moderate gaps may do the job. If I could purchase 1/4" drywall that would be great, but I've never seen anything less than 3/8" stuff. Maybe 3/16" plywood with a skim coat will work.

In any case I'm not happy with a 1 1/4" high top rail for the wall cabinets. I'm going to increase that to 3", since I will apply a narrow trim piece (3/4-1.5" high) to the top of the cabinet whether I repair the soffit or not.

Any additional ideas on how to build up the soffit to eliminate the soffit slope would be welcome.

Thanks again.

Bob

[Bill Dufour]

If you have lighting in the soffit you can not just cover it with cabinets and trim. You have to find the power supply and disconnect it. Otherwise some one could turn them on and eventually they will overheat and start a fire since there not be any airflow to cool things off. At the very least remove the bulbs. This may be as simple as capping off a line in a switch box.
Code says any junction box must be accessible. If you just disconnect at the first light fixture that will be a violation and the inspector will make you pull the cabinets to fix the problem.
Bill

[Wayne Lomman]

Before demolishing anything, check the floor level in comparison to the soffit level. They may be parallel.

My approach in older houses is to have 150 high kickers and 150 high heads/top rail. Any height variations are thus rendered undetectable by most people, especially considering the human tendency to not look above eye level.

In general, taking cupboards all the way to the ceiling sounds great, but how tall is the main user of the kitchen? Are a set of steps provided for access to the top shelf?
Don't ignore the fact that soffits remove the dust trap on top of cupboards which no-one likes to get up to clean. Soffits may have originated in the 70s but it is really the decoration that dates a kitchen, not the soffit. Cheers

[Ole Anderson]

I was fortunate on my last kitchen remodel, the soffits were not hiding anything, so they came down, but not without a fight. Tall cabinets get rid of that 70's look. Crown molding filled any gaps. Infrequently used things go on the top shelves. I say if you are going to do a kitchen remodel, take it down to the studs and start with a fresh sheet of paper, including lighting. I went with six 5" cans with LED's, located to illuminate counter space, 90 watts total with the kitchen light on. By removing your soffits and the kitchen ceiling, you have the ease of easily rewiring the lighting and shimming the joists to flatten your ceiling. In my case, I also got rid of the ceiling texture which I would have not been able to easily match after the soffits were taken out.

[Robert Engel]

I'm assuming the soffit extends beyond the cabs, right?

Please post a pic so we can see what you're talking about.

Anyway, if I'm understanding this, you could make a frame and apply to the bottom of the soffit shimmed to level, then re-face with 3/8" drywall. Check the lights the mounting flanges might still work.

Bottom line I would do away with the soffit and install recessed lighting in the ceiling and use undermounts on the upper cabs.

I also don't get the narrow top rails???

[Charles Lent]

If the soffits have an inch or more of the bottom facing edge that can be covered, how about building custom cabinets with a top rail that will overlap the uneven bottom edge of the soffit. The cabinets would need to be 1" deeper, and an outside end cabinet 1" wider, but it will hide the uneven bottom edge of the soffit. I haven't tried this, it's just a thought. Ignore me if you wish.

Charley

[Brice Rogers]

As Brian said, 3/4" is huge. I have a new car that is about 3/8" from being level left-to-right and I can see it and it irritates me.

I'd take the soffits apart and fix the out-of-level situation. If you try to take care of the problem with the cabinetry, I think that it is going to look goofy.

[Martin Wasner]

I've built a set of kitchen cabinets but it takes a very patient wife which is not what I currently have.

I feel your pain. I'm a professional cabinetmaker. I had our kitchen gutted, rewired, replumbed, and retiled with new cabinets and countertops in less than two months working on it in the evenings and weekends. She still winced and whined about how long it took. The GREATEST thing about it? We don't cook. Hahahahaha

To the OP, tear the soffit out of it's not hiding some mechanical nightmare. That's a 50/50 on whether it is or isn't. Pick a crown you like. Depending on how far out of whack the actual ceiling is you can adjust the spring on the crown and twist it into place to hide the variances. It does take a medium sized or larger crown to make that work through. The little stuff puts up to much of a fight.

[John Connelly]

it takes a very patient wife which is not what I currently have
I would definitely not spend a lot of time trying to make new cabinets work with old, poorly constructed soffits. Remove them or fix them.

He speaks the truth! Also, don't do any demo work until your new cabinets are built and any other major materials are on site. If you are uncomfortable (or slow like me) redoing the soffits/drywall, hire someone. When it comes to projects like this downtime is a huge issue.

[Bob Deroeck]

Thanks for all the thoughtful responses. I've attached 3 photos which show all of the soffit. The house is a ranch with a 5-in-12 roof. So, getting to the recessed lights above the sink is almost impossible. It was just possible in that I did that to replaced the failed recessed lighting fixtures which were "drywalled-in". That job is right near the top of "worst jobs I've ever had to do". As you can see I replaced the drywall around the fixtures with plywood and will add trim to hid the drywall/plywood joint. All of the plywood and trim, including the window header trim will be screwed and removable to allow future access to the recessed light fixtures.

The high point of the soffit in at the corner to the right of the stove.

You guys have convinced me that the soffits should be removed, replaced, or fixed prior to installing new wall cabinets. I have a large pantry with plenty of cabinet space on the other end of the kitchen, so I don't need the extra cabinet space from having taller wall cabinets. Also, I like the recessed lights above the sink and the area with the half wall is located. The recessed lights in the soffit near the stove can be deleted. They are used occasionally, but we usually are using the hood lights or undercabinet lights to light the counter top in this area. Because the soffits are all tied together and I want to retain them over the sink and half wall area, I'm leaning towards modifying the existing soffit to eliminate the slope. I'm thinking of using tapered shims glued to the existing soffit bottom with construction adhesive and covered with 1/4" drywall. Then, setting joint compound or plaster, or a combination of the two would be used to fill in the relatively large sloping areas at the end of the 1/4" drywall. Any other thoughts on how to modify the soffit to eliminate the gap where it will meet the new cabinets would be welcome.

Wayne asked about the floor level. It's off by about 7/8", but the soffit is not parallel to the floor. The high point of the floor does not match the high point of the soffit. My plan for addressing the out-of-level of the floor was shimming the base cabinets to be plumb and level with the stone countertop level at 36" above the floor at the high point of the floor and accepting variation of the countertop height above the floor of +7/8", so there would be a maximum countertop to floor distance of 36 7/8 at the low point of the floor. My wife says she's OK with this. Any comments on this approach are also welcome, though I'm pretty sure I will not consider tearing up the floor and subfloor, shimming the floor joists, and reinstalling the subfloor and oak floor.

Bob


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[Brian Holcombe]

FWIW, Crown molding is going to look out of place in a mid-century ranch house. I would avoid doing any heavy crown or any crown for that matter. If you really need a molding for something, make up a plain molding.

Mid-Century ranch is a modern period home and so the original style should be respected for any renovations, in my opinion. Modern means working with reveals and plain moldings. The layering of moldings was largely done away with or simplified in mid century housing.

If you take out the soffit, I would likely make similar length cabinets and just leave clear space above the cabinets. The trend currently is to have wall-units for storage/oven/refridge and to completely do away with the upper cabinets. It can be a bit extreme in cases where they're needed for storage, but IMO it looks quite nice especially in modern homes. So I don't think that having full length cabinets is really necessary.

Very tall cabinets are befitting a Victorian style, which largely based on the Victorian butler's pantry, which were often heavily detailed and utilized floor to ceiling cabinetry. If you take notice that when people refer to their victorian style kitchen, it is very much unlike a victorian period kitchen which was mostly a workhorse of a room with a giant cast iron stove. Instead the detail has been borrowed from the Butler's pantry.

[Mel Fulks]

I still say a couple of strips making a rabbet will make all OK. The problem is commercial interests are focused on constant
change. Soffits have to go ....or many will have no reason to buy new cabinets. I'm crazy enough to think that cabinet height has nothing to do with anything beyond quantity of stuff. But I predict that since Boomers are ageing ,kind designers will soon demand NEW soffits to protect us from falling off ladders.

[Ole Anderson]

FWIW, Crown molding is going to look out of place in a mid-century ranch house.

It may, if you want to keep the outdated look of a mid-century ranch. I didn't. When I did the kitchen, I had my buddy crown the living room and hallway to get rid of the cracks that were showing up at the joint. Looks much nicer now.