homestyles Americana Off-White Kitchen Island

I have a small kitchen and bought this to use as additional counter space, as well as somewhere to hide the big bag of dog food and the cat's wet food, so I did not attach the "leaf" that makes this an island to pull up a stool and eat.It arrived in 3 large boxes, and I have a dolly that I used to get the boxes from the front door and into the house. I could slide the boxes on towels to the living room. The boxes are labeled "1 of 3" "2 of 3" and "3 of 3" so you know which one to open first. I found the directions to be very clear if you made sure your pieces were aligned as shown in the diagrams. I laid out the box 1 pieces and retrieved the hardware from box 2. Be careful when you are screwing the cam bolts into the predrilled holes that you put them in very straight. If they go in crooked your cam lock will not work, and even with them straight I found the cam locks loosened easily. However, as you build the pieces start to reinforce each other and so you get some structural rigidity. The most difficult piece for me was the top, which is one section (you don't have to put it together). It weighs about fifty pounds and is bulky. However, I was able to lift it to the edge of the base and then slide it onto the pegs that fit into it from below. Naturally, after everything was screwed down I realized that one of the doors would not close. It had previously been closed, so I had to loosen a couple of the screws that hold down the top to make the doors align again. The non-scratch feet will screw up and down to act as levelers but lifting the thing when it's all put together would be a two person job. Fortunately for me I leveled as I went along. All in all, it took me about four hours to put it together, but I did not hurry and took some breaks.It is spacious inside, it hides the dog and cat food, the spare leash and collars, and some rarely used appliances. The side shelves hold my blender, mortar and pestle, waffle maker, and kitchen scale.It is white--not bright white, but definitely a blue-toned white rather than a yellow-toned white. It looks fine in my kitchen with white quartz countertops and a white corner storage unit that I bought from another supplier a few years ago. I would not call the wood top a "distressed" finish, at least not the way "distressed" was a few years ago. There are no gouges and it doesn't look like it was hit with chains! The grain is pronounced and mine doesn't have any wormholes. I may change out the wood top for quartz some time in the future, I believe that the unit is sturdy enough to carry the weight.All in all I am very pleased with it.

Where to begin? First off, I bought and assembled this Americana White & Distressed Oak Kitchen Island by Home Styles in October, 2018. It is now May of 2019, and it still looks beautiful and its functionality is fantastic. I have a super small and narrow kitchen, but there’s an open space/breakfast area in front of it where this fits perfectly. Any bigger, and it wouldn’t work. Any smaller, and it wouldn’t look right. I was worried it wouldn’t be large enough, but it ended up being a little larger than I was thinking, so it really worked out well.That said, this is definitely not a small island, nor anywhere close to the kinds of islands/carts with wheels that you can move around. It’s heavy, and SOLID. While I struggled to put this together myself (as a woman who can use basic tools), it was not because it was confusing or that difficult, per se. It was simply because some parts of it were too heavy for me to handle on my own without help, namely the top portion, which is installed last. I had my oldest son (strong teenager) help me launch that part on. Be prepared to have help with this, no matter how handy you may be, and also be aware that this comes in multiple large and VERY heavy boxes upon delivery.This isn’t your run-of-the-mill type of DIY cheap furniture. This is solid wood throughout, and much higher quality than most of what you’ll find in box stores in this genre and size. I was pleasantly surprised at the quality, detail and thickness of all of it, all the way to the top of it. It’s beautiful and wonderfully functional, and with the extension out, it really provides a decent amount of space to do whatever you need while prepping food, etc. My youngest son loves the extension out to sit at this island like a table to work on his homework while I’m making dinner, and there’s plenty of space for it all. We’ve all enjoyed using this each and every day, several times a day, since we’ve had it. So far in 6-7 months, it has functioned flawlessly. While scratches can happen, they’re hard to see on this piece, as the finish doesn’t come off easily at all. My son is either always doing his homework with pointy pencils, drawing something, or otherwise using it for crafts and whathaveyou, and while you can look closely and see the tiniest of indentations from all that, they’re practically invisible because there’s no chips or anything going beyond the top finish to make it obvious. It’s obviously not butcher block, so you couldn’t, say, slap down a piece of meat and start chopping away on the bare top without a cutting board...but it holds up surprisingly well under heavy use, cleans up easily, and doesn’t appear to crack, chip, scratch, etc very easily.The only thing I will add is to make sure you factor in the dimensions of this thing, including the extension piece. When I ordered this, I looked at the dimensions and for some reason, wasn’t factoring in that extra extension. Luckily for me, it still fit our space perfectly, but someone with less wiggle room might be unpleasantly surprised to find that it is bigger than anticipated once assembled. Make SURE you include that extra extension in your calculations, because this thing is a tank, and you don’t want to have to return it.Overall, this is super sturdy and very high quality for an island this size, and if you’re on the fence at all about this one, you needn’t be. You’ll love it! The price point is more than fair, in my book, especially considering the quality of the item. The shelves, drawers, and interior add roomy storage, and the little side shelves on the outside are very practical for storing even more items. All in all, this is one of my favorite purchases, and I’m thrilled that it’s working out so well, looks so good, and holding up like a champ after 6-7 months of heavy use. My cabinets are a slight off-white, which matches the colors on this island so close that you have to really look hard to see a difference in the shade. Definite WIN in all categories!

This is a really beautiful piece of furniture. Made very nice, heavy, and craftsmanship is very nice. The wood top is beautiful! Fast shipping. Well packaged. Very little had to be put together. Drawers and hardware was already put together. Hinges were already on the doors. Holes drilled perfect. Had to attach the walls to the bottom and put the top on. Well worth the money!

This Island took only 1 hour for me to unbox and assemble. It comes in 3 boxes. The base, top including sliding drawers and four corner pillars come fully assembled. So assembly is pretty much put the corner and wall dividers together on the base, then add the top, shelves and doors.The problem came with the last part. For the four drawer nobs, I received three M4 25mm bolts and one M4 20mm bolt. I should have received four M4 25mm bolts. So on the last drawer, the bolt was too short would not make it through the wood and could not attach the nob. I tried swapping a with the other draws which did not help. So my 1 hour assemble became a 2 hour assemble because I had to go to the hardware store and dig through the metric bolt draw for one bolt.The day before I had assembled an IKEA 5ft console cabinet. So I would like to compare the two. The IKEA console looks simple but had three times the amount of hardware and took 3 hours to assemble as all parts came separated. So I was relieved to find this kitchen island so easy to assemble. The IKEA parts all fit tight with precision, I think they are manufacture with tighter tolerance. This kitchen island all fit together, but some parts did not feel tight. The shelves also were very loose. However, I had no issues, and the end result looks great.I drop this from 5 to 4 stars because of pack of part precision and QA for the hardware parts as noticed above.