Built-Ins vs. Freestanding Furniture: Should You Add Built-In Storage?

Walk into a historic Twin Cities home, and chances are you’ll see built-ins featured in at least one room. Built-in cabinets and shelves have been popular for decades because they create storage while blending seamlessly with your home’s architecture and design. 

If you’re looking to add, modernize, or eliminate these fixtures in your home, James Barton Design-Build is here to lend our ideas, expertise, and unique skill set to help make your home your own. 

What are Built-Ins? 

Built-ins are elements of the home that are permanently attached to the interior, from cabinets to seating to shelving. This style became particularly popular during the Arts & Crafts movement of the late 1800s, which prioritized simplicity and pragmatism. And since many Minneapolis and St. Paul homes were constructed during that time, built-ins have become part of the local architecture. 

Structural shelves and cabinets can be found in many areas of the home, including: 

• Bookcases and cabinets by a fireplace. 
• Media centers for TVs and speakers. 
• Bookcases that divide rooms and help define spaces. 
• Window seats with storage in the bench. 
• Custom desks in alcoves. 
• Mud rooms with benches and shelving. 
• Breakfast nooks and bench seating in the dining room. 
• Headboards, nightstands, and recessed shelving by the bed. 
• Murphy beds that fold into a custom-built cabinet. 

The Pros of Built-Ins 

Built-in shelves and cabinets are beneficial for a number of reasons. They provide: 

• Customizable, functional design. Instead of worrying about industry-standard sizes, built-ins fit into your home. This means you can make the most of smaller or quirkier spaces, which are found in lots of Twin Cities homes. 
• Character and charm. Built-in bookshelves, for example, can add a cozy and personable feel to any area, including under the stairs, where they’re gaining popularity. Meanwhile, a built-in buffet is a classic way to elevate your dining room. 
• Better home marketability. If you’re thinking about getting rid of your built-ins, think again. Plenty of potential homeowners love their look and functionality. It can often be a selling point, especially in historic homes where structural storage is part of the home’s unique identity. 
• Better use of space. Built-in cabinets, shelving, and bookshelves are often built to fill awkward spaces where you can’t use standard furniture. Not only does this make unusable spaces more functional, but it also helps them feel like an intentional part of your home design. 

Thinking about adding custom storage? JBDB’s team can design and build a solution that’s both practical and beautiful, and that fits your family’s needs. Contact us to talk about your design ideas!

The Cons of Built-Ins

Built-in furniture may serve the same purpose as freestanding cabinets and shelves. However, it is integrated into your home’s design, which also means it’s a permanent fixture. 

While this is great for making spaces more usable, it also limits how you can arrange other furniture in your space. Having a built-in media console, for example, means your living room furniture virtually always needs to stay in the same place. But in some spaces, the options might already be limited by the placement of doors and windows. 

Another potential drawback is that you can’t take them with you. If you move, you can’t take built-ins because they’re legally considered fixtures of your home. For that reason, adding new custom-built-ins is best if you plan to stay in the same house for the foreseeable future.  

Can You Remove Built-Ins? 

Because built-ins have been around for so long, they’re not always conducive to modern life. After all, we live differently today than earlier generations. Their materials, layout, or placement might be competing with your preferences.

​Removing built-ins can be tricky, but that doesn’t mean you’re stuck with their existing look. With a professional design-build team, you can easily modify built-ins. Enameling the wood, wallpapering the interior, and adding customized fixtures like glass panes or new handles can give new life to an under-utilized part of your home.

“Our team is highly experienced at modifying or modernizing built-ins to fit our clients’ preferred design,” says Morgan Longhenry, designer at James Barton Design-Build. “This allows you to bring historical elements into the modern world without disrupting the home’s structural integrity.”

Before

After

Designer Insight: Built-ins don’t always need to be large structural elements of your home. In the kitchen. A microwave cabinet is an elegant way to house this clumsy device within the aesthetics of your kitchen design. Apply the same mindset to a mini-refrigerator for the same streamlined look that marries convenience and beauty.

Can You Add Custom Built-In Cabinets to a Home? 

After the 1960s, built-in furniture started losing popularity in new constructions in the Twin Cities. If you live in a home built in the 70s, 80s, or 90s without built-ins, you can still achieve the look you want with a renovation. Adding built-in furniture is actually a very common request when making renovation plans. Renovating to add custom storage requires careful planning. Here are a few aspects you will want to consider: 

• Outlets and Cords: Building permanent cabinets often requires moving outlets or adding an extension box that brings the outlet flush with the interior of the cabinet. This lets you use the outlet without trying to run cords behind anything structural. 
• Vent Placement: If there are vents, floor registers or baseboard heating along the wall where you want to add cabinets, it will be a more involved process. However, JBDB can reroute HVAC ducts to accommodate your design, as we did in this Apple Valley kitchen remodel.
• Crown Molding & Trim: To make your built-ins fit seamlessly with your home’s design, you often need to remove trim so the cabinets sit flush with your walls and ceiling. This can involve replacing trim throughout the area in order to create a cohesive design. 
• Fixing Wall & Floor Imperfections: Even if custom cabinets are built well, they can appear uneven if your floor, wall, or ceiling framing isn’t perfectly straight. Making cabinets look polished and professional may require extra work to address unevenness first. 

Can you do it yourself? Many homeowners plan DIY built-ins by framing existing furniture with crown molding and trim. It’s one of the more popular DIY renovations, but doing it right is actually more complicated than it seems. Dealing with vents and uneven walls is difficult for most DIYers. And with Minnesota having some of the strictest electrical codes in the U.S., moving outlets or using outlet extension boxes while staying up to code is challenging

What would you change about your own home? 

When you look around your home, are there elements you’d like to adapt to better suit your life? Maybe your built-in cabinets are taking up valuable space in your dining room, or you’d like to add wood built-in bookshelves to your living room.

Let the team at James Barton Design-Build help you make your home your own. Fill out our contact form to begin your home remodeling journey.