How Long Does a Kitchen Renovation Take?

People ring our workshop expecting the install week to be the long part. In reality, the days when we're physically in your home are usually the quickest stretch of the whole job. Most of the timeline sits in the planning and making, and knowing that up front makes the wait far easier to live with.

The honest big picture

For a typical full kitchen renovation in a Gisborne home, plan on roughly 8 to 14 weeks from your first phone call to the day you're cooking on your new benchtop. A straightforward like-for-like replacement can land at the shorter end. A larger reconfiguration, with walls moving or new plumbing and wiring, pushes toward the longer end.

That range isn't us hedging. It genuinely depends on how settled your design is, what materials you choose, and how many other trades need to weave in around us.

The install is the visible part, but design and manufacture are where the time actually lives. Get those right and the rest runs smoothly.

Design and sign-off: 2 to 4 weeks

This is where we start, and it's worth not rushing. After an initial chat and a site measure, we work up a layout, cabinetry details, and finishes. Because we design, build and install in-house, there's no handing off between separate companies, which keeps this stage tighter than it often is elsewhere.

The thing that stretches this phase is decision-making, not drawing. Choosing your door style, benchtop material, handles, and colours can take a weekend or it can take a month. My advice:

• Collect a few reference photos before we meet, so we're refining rather than starting cold.
• Decide your benchtop early — laminate, engineered stone and timber all have different lead times.
• Lock appliances before sign-off, because their dimensions drive the cabinetry.

Nothing goes into manufacture until you've signed off the final plan. Changes after that point are where timelines and budgets quietly blow out.

Lead times: the wait you don't see

Once you sign off, we order materials and components. This is the invisible stretch that catches people out, because nothing appears to be happening while we wait on suppliers.

Standard board and hardware usually arrive quickly. The longer waits come from engineered stone benchtops, specialty European hinges or runners, and imported or made-to-order appliances. In Gisborne we're also at the end of the supply chain, so a delivery that's quick in Auckland can take a few extra days to reach us.

If your heart is set on a particular stone or a specific oven, tell us early. We'd rather order it the day you sign off than discover a six-week wait halfway through.

Manufacture: 2 to 4 weeks

With everything on hand, your cabinetry is built in our workshop. Carcasses, doors, drawers and any custom joinery are cut, assembled and finished here, away from the dust and disruption of your home.

Building offsite is deliberate. It means the messy, time-consuming work happens in a controlled space, and your house only becomes a worksite for the final, shorter install stage. Custom and one-off pieces naturally take longer than standard runs, so a heavily bespoke kitchen sits at the upper end of this window.

Install week (or two): the part you'll feel

Now we're in your home. For most kitchens, the on-site work runs one to two weeks, and it follows a fairly set order:

• Strip-out of the old kitchen, usually a day.
• Services — any plumbing, electrical or gas changes roughed in.
• Cabinetry install, levelled and fixed in place.
• Benchtop templating and fitting — for engineered stone this is a separate visit, often a week after cabinets go in, because it's templated to the installed units.
• Splashback, sink, appliances and final fit-off, then a tidy and check.

That benchtop gap is the single most common surprise. You'll have cabinets but no usable bench for a few days while the stone is fabricated to your exact measurements. It's worth setting up a temporary kitchen corner for that week.

What actually causes delays

In my experience, hold-ups rarely come from the cabinetmaking. They come from:

• Late decisions or changes after sign-off.
• Hidden issues behind the old kitchen — rot, dodgy old wiring, uneven walls common in older Gisborne homes.
• Supplier delays on stone or appliances.
• Coordinating other trades around everyone's schedule.

We build a sensible buffer into every quote and back our work with a 5-year workmanship warranty, so the focus stays on doing it properly rather than fast.

If you're planning ahead, the best thing you can do is start the conversation early and settle your big choices before manufacture begins. Get those sorted, and the rest tends to take care of itself.