Monday, July 9, 2012

Transitional Wood Shakers in Black Walnut, Quartered White Oak and More


Northern Contours is introducing a new line of transitional style Shaker doors that they’ve called “Shift”. I was excited about these when they first debuted them in their Wood & Veneer Product Guide as I’ve always loved contemporary styles but have never had a living space that would fit with a full-on contemporary kitchen. These new styles, with their larger stiles & rails and different grain directions, do a brilliant job of merging traditional materials and construction with contemporary lines and design sensibilities.

  • The Stride and Symmetry styles have the familiar square edges around a 3” frame with the Stride having a shallow flat panel and the Symmetry having a flat panel with a deeper recess.

Shift Series


  • The Degree shares the 3” frame size but sports a deep bevel on the horizontal rails of the frame. This works beautifully with a horizontal straight grain on the panel.

  • While the EuroShaker and the Attitude styles have the 3” vertical stiles, they both stand out with dramatic 4” rails at the top and bottom. The rails on the EuroShaker have square profiles while the Attitude has a deep bevel similar to the Degree.

  The standard drawer fronts for all styles are slab and 3-piece. For larger drawers, Northern suggests ordering a door with the appropriate grain direction. There is no reduced rail option available. All of the styles listed are available in Cherry, Maple, Red Oak, Quartered White Oak and Black Walnut. All species are Select Grade meaning they’ve been selected for maximum grain and color consistency. Northern also offers finishing in thirteen stain colors and two paint colors.

  Since the transitional style of these doors work so well with both traditional and contemporary designs, they can be incorporated into a wide variety of jobs. They can add a touch of contemporary to a traditional office or they can be the more traditional doors in a kitchen with aluminum framed accent doors. Even something as simple as changing the grain direction from plain sliced vertical to horizontal straight grain can radically change the look of a design giving this series of doors a much broader range of applications than the modest five styles would initially suggest.

  Take the time to browse these styles. They really help to expand your horizons. If you find traditional styles too tired but contemporary styles too severe, there is a whole world of design options available between the two. Northern Contours just added a lot more colors to the design palette. 

1 comment:

  1. Thanks for sharing this article with us! I was reading different articles online trying to gather tips on how to decorate kitchen hardware. You have given me some great ideas, and have helped a lot. I'm definitely going to share this post with my friends, thank you again for sharing!

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