The Carcass

• Euro-style kitchen with full overlay drawers.green kitchen image by Leonid Nyshko from Fotolia.com
  
  Both framed and frameless kitchen cabinets begin with a basic box, which cabinet-makers call a carcass. You will build your carcass with some form of plywood or medium density fiberboard, but commonly 3/4 inch shop birch. Inexpensive mass-market cabinets sometimes have particle-board carcasses. Plywood makes a sturdier carcass, particularly with respect to hinge-attachment. Hinges attached to fiberboard and particle board can loosen or even pull out unless you take care with hinge-selection and attachment. Whether Euro-style or framed, the carcass material has no particular aesthetic significance because you don't see the carcass itself; you see the drawers, doors, countertops and, for framed cabinets, the frame.
  
  

Doors on Framed and Frameless Cabinets

• A frameless cabinet's doors fit directly over the carcass (hence "overlay). A framed cabinet has doors that fit into or onto a frame that attaches to the carcass. Framed cabinets look more traditional because you see more different cabinet elements. Frameless cabinets have an uncomplicated contemporary, or Euro, look because when you look at the front of a frameless cabinet all you see are the overlay doors, which may simply be a piece of edged hardwood plywood. "Edged" means that the cabinet maker has glued a thin veneer of hardwood over the four edges of the plywood.
  
  

The Frame

• To understand the difference between a full overlay door and a reveal door you need to consider the frame first. It consists of a top rail, a bottom rail, two stiles (the side pieces) and, often, stretchers--horizontal pieces that go between the top drawer and the door. You typically will make these elements from 1-inch thick hardwood. Width dimensions vary, but the top rail and stiles might be a 3-inch wide and the bottom rail a little less, possibly 2 1/2 inches.You permanently attach these frames to the carcass.
  
  

The Door and Door Frame

• When you pick up a cabinet frame before attachment to the carcass, it looks just like an empty picture frame. If you then make a door that has the same dimensions as the outer dimensions of the frame, you will have a full overlay door. You won't see the frame at all until you open the door. You also can make a door that's a little smaller than the frame; when you close this smaller door, it will reveal part of the frame, hence the name "reveal."
  
  

Some Other Door Types for Framed Cabinets

• You can also make a door with the same dimensions as the inside frame dimensions, then fit this door inside the frame, making an inset door or drawer. Alternatively, you can cut a rabbet, basically a small cutout, around the four edges of the back of a drawer. The door, slightly larger than the inside dimensions of the frame, now fits partially into the door-frame and partially over it, making a lipped door.
  
  

Which Is Better?

• When you build a frameless cabinet, you will necessarily have a full overlay door because there's no frame to reveal. With framed cabinets, you have the choices described above: full overlay, partial overlay (or reveal), inset or lipped. The full overlay always looks simpler or more contemporary; the other choices look more traditional. All door types function similarly, but you will make aesthetic choices to match your general aesthetic preferences and the overall look of the kitchen.