You can judge the quality of any cabinetry on three criteria, says Lynn Harker, an owner of Woodland Furniture in eastern Idaho. The first is design. "It should be beautiful and it should be truly custom," says Harker. Next is the finish. As a furniture maker, Woodland can accurately boast that its cabinetry has furniture-grade finishes. "A lot of companies don’t have the capability to apply that kind of finish," he says. Third on Harker’s list is what’s beneath the finish, the cabinets themselves—what they’re made of and how they’re constructed. "To satisfy the demands of the discriminating buyer, you really need all three," says Harker.

Here we showcase projects from Woodland and other companies that score high on the cabinetmaking test.

Clive Christian
Clive Christian has garnered much attention for creating the world’s most expensive perfume, Imperial Majesty, which costs $215,000 for 16.9 ounces (bottled in Baccarat crystal and topped with a five-carat diamond and an 18-karat-gold collar.) No doubt he will draw much attention this spring when he releases his first new scent in 10 years. But not to be overlooked is the cabinetry his namesake company creates.
 
The study shown here is lined with cabinetry from the Clive Christian Classic Design Style collection, which the company first introduced in 1990. The collection is intended to evoke the opulent designs of the Victorian and Regency eras.

The company is headquartered in England, where all of its furniture is handmade, and it has 16 showrooms in the United States, including a flagship showroom in New York City.

Woodland Furniture
Headquartered in Idaho Falls, Idaho, Woodland Furniture offers bench-made furniture, cabinetry, upholstery, lighting, and handmade rugs exclusively to the interior design trade, not the public. The company was founded in 1996 by Lynn Harker and his wife, Pat, who previously had operated her own design firm.
 
“We do everything from transitional to very rustic,” says Lynn Harker. The company’s collections are represented at a number of design showrooms across the country, including Terrell Goeke in Chicago. The home-office built-ins shown here are on display at the Goeke showroom. The kitchen cabinetry, which displays a number of custom, hand-carved accents, is in a home in Logan, Utah. “That kitchen is filled with one-of-a-kind features,” says Harker.

Studio Becker
Studio Becker, which designs its products in Italy and builds them in Germany, creates customized cabinets for kitchens, bathrooms, and wardrobes in traditional, contemporary, and ultramodern styles. The company is headquartered in Alameda, Calif., and sells its cabinets at 14 independently owned showrooms in the United States.

The walnut kitchen cabinetry shown here is in a Tudor home in Piedmont, Calif. The custom details include the glass on the display cabinets in the butler’s pantry, the thickness of the doors on the rest of the cabinets, and the sheen on the wood finish throughout the kitchen. Not pictured is a sitting area adjacent to the kitchen that includes a custom entertainment center and wainscoting that complements the kitchen cabinetry. Studio Becker also built custom paneling for a walk-in pantry that’s hidden between two refrigerators.
 
For the custom-designed vanity, in the bathroom of a high-rise condo in San Francisco, Studio Becker combined teak and black lacquer to create the Asian look that the homeowner requested.