Rustic Hickory Cabinets: 7 Design Ideas For Your Home

If you have ever been to a lake house or a countryside cottage, you will recognize the familiar brownish ochre-colored cabinets that seem to be a part of all traditional cabins. These cabinets are commonly known as rustic hickory cabinets.

Hickory is a dense hardwood with a natural look and feel that appeals to people due to its very distinctive grain and color pattern. The knots, burls, pitch pockets, and character marks you will find on hickory cabinets are a charming feature of this hardwood.

For most of their history, hickory cabinets were confined to log cabins, cottages, and countryside homes. However, with the demand for warmer spaces and mid-century designs, people are leaning towards incorporating these modern hickory kitchen cabinets in their city homes.

If you are also looking to add a rustic touch to your house, read more to explore some ideas on how and where to use rustic hickory cabinets.

 

Make a Warm and Inviting Kitchen

Designers unanimously agree that the best place to use rustic hickory cabinets is your kitchen. With its various color patterns ranging from creamy white to dark brown or black, there is something for everyone.

Once you pick a color for your cabinets, the next step is to paint the wall behind them in contrast. To add a contemporary touch to the space, you can also put up some lift hinge wall cabinets with opaque glass and universal oven cabinets.

If you want, you can paint the island in a different color to contrast with the rest of the room. Otherwise, a countertop with just a darker or lighter shade of the same color works as well.

Knotty hickory kitchen cabinets are not only aesthetic but also incredibly durable. This feature comes in handy for a space as high-traffic as the kitchen.

Hickory stands out in natural designs and offers endless variations with knots, twists, and heavy grain. A kitchen would embrace and showcase this imperfection beautifully.

 

A Rustic Island in the Kitchen

While it is a great idea to put up rustic hickory cabinets all around your kitchen, another option is to use hickory wood as the center point of the kitchen. A hickory island can add extra storage, preparation space, and seating area in your kitchen.

Decide the size of your kitchen island based on your own needs and the available space. Ensure that the island is going with the theme of the rest of the kitchen.

You can use rustic hickory as the material for the island and keep the countertop white or a lighter shade of marble. Mix and match using relevant colors such as blue, brown, or black for eclectic results.

In contrast with the focal point, keep the cabinets off-white and use an earth tone for the backsplash to make the space look more streamlined.

Lastly, pick some pendant lights to hang on top of the island so that the seating space is well-lit.

 

Design Bathroom Vanity with Style

Another popular home space to adorn this beautiful hardwood is the bathroom vanity. There are dozens of designs you can utilize to make your bathroom farmhouse-style.

One of the options is to use hickory as the bathroom floor but this is tricky because the changing humidity levels can damage the wood in the long run. However, engineered hickory wood floors are being produced to make this option viable.

The more commonly used option is to use rustic hickory cabinets as vanity. Hickory vanities are a great way to add style and storage to your bathroom. A rustic-style bathroom feels inviting, cozy, and relaxing. You immediately feel at ease in the natural aura of this wooden masterpiece.

Add a big mirror, a farmhouse sink, and dark bronze hardware and you have got yourself an elegant and eternally relevant bathroom design.

You can also try out a hickory vanity sink base with a regular drop in sink top instead of a farmhouse sink to finish off the look within a budget that's still creates a statement.

 

Get Durable Modern Hickory Kitchen Cabinets for Storage

If there is one thing that people always struggle with in modern homes, it's storage space. When you worry about the aesthetics too much, it can compromise the functionality.

Using rustic hickory wall cabinets serves as a prominent advantage in this regard. You can put these cabinets all over the house and hide sinks, sockets, and trash cans behind this wood without worrying about ruining the theme of the house. Somehow, it fits everywhere.

 

Add Character to Your Bedroom

Having a bedroom built-in closet can make your life easier. And who says you cannot have a bedroom closet in style? With its versatility and character, a rustic hickory bedroom closet will serve as the perfect addition to your master room.

The durability of this hardwood will ensure that you can hang dozens of clothes without worrying about the wood collapsing on itself.

Moreover, you have endless customization options for your closet. Add drawers, hanging spaces, and shelves to your heart’s content so that you don’t have to worry about adjusting to the closet. Instead, the closet will adjust to your stuff!

Other ways that you can use rustic hickory around your house to compliment the rest of the furniture are as follows:

 

 

Enrich the Floors with Subway Tiles

What makes rustic hickory desirable is that even though the basic idea of the wood is the same, there are a lot of variations you can play with. Some of the variations are natural in the form of wavy grains and some variations you can produce by staining the wood.

If you are using darker stains of hickory as the cabinets or vanities, keeping the floor a darker shade of the same wood can maintain consistency with the theme of the room. These floors are also easy to clean and maintain so it can save a lot of time.

Just make sure that you are not using hickory floors in a place with a lot of humidity, especially if the wood is not engineered.

In opposition, you can also keep the cabinets of a different material altogether such as concrete or marble with hardwood floors to give a modern touch.

 

Coordinating a Shiplap Design

While this is not a cabinet, it is equally relevant to figure out how to keep the hickory cabinets aligned with the rest of the room. So, planning a shiplap transition is a great call.

What you need to understand about modern homes is the concept of “white space”. White space is used to separate and group elements in a design in order to make them relate to one another and keep the visual cues organized.

Using hickory in shiplap transition can give the space a matching texture and interest while keeping the space open. 

 

Takeaway

Designing your home can be a fun yet challenging task. You will make a choice, change it, and then change it back several times before you settle on an option that speaks to you.

If you are picking rustic hickory as the theme of your space, you have endless options on what to do with the cabinets and where to put them up. Follow this guide for a general idea or consult a professional interior designer to make your living dreams come true!

 

FAQs

1. What color goes well with hickory cabinets?
Modern hickory kitchen cabinets look best with earthy hues and different shades of blue and green. For the backsplash, use chilly and neutral undertone wall colors.

2. Are rustic hickory cabinets expensive?
Yes. Due to their unique features, hickory can be expensive but it is still cheaper than oak.

3. What color is natural hickory?
The hickory heartwood is brown or reddish brown while the hickory sapwood is white or creamy colored.