Hi again watchedpoppy, most overhead cabinets are actually 300mm deep for ergonomic reasons; where they can sit 450mm above your bench. This allows a clear line of sight over the benchtop (and without hitting your head). In recent times manufacturers are making Undermount Range Hoods deeper and they need 450mm deep cabinets, but this is perfectly fine for a range hood cabinet because these deeper units need to be set around 700mm above your benchtop, and have a high cubic metre per minute m3/m extraction rate, where again ergonomically you still see your bench clearly and also do not hit your head on the cabinet. With this arrangement though we recommend that you do not step down the overhead cabinets next to the hood, but keep these also around 700mm above the benchtop like the photos here of a kitchen with a Falmec Undermount Hood that we made recently. Free standing Canopy hoods are set up with this same principal, have higher extraction rates and these usually protrude out even further at around 500mm deep. Hope this helps allay any concern. Regards; Malcolm

all our spas with still water levels above shoulder height when sitting are the most comfortable to use for sitting and swimming and we found that allowing unsupervised kids to use our spas can be problem with damage and safety issues so water height should suit the sitting height of your adults

I have used the 58cmx 236cm, plus a corner unit Ikea Pax in my recent apartment reno (not built in cabinetry, as standalone units), and previously had the Flexi Wire/Wall solution in a rental property I was in within a built in. Given the situation you're in where you can't change the depth, I would go the Flexi Wire/Wall System. The 36cm is not deep enough to hang clothing and the other solutions (e.g. Elvari) are potentially okay, but I feel are more expensive (I haven't costed them out though from a configuration stand point though, to be fair)? I've also tried to get additional pieces for my Pax recently and it's so difficult at the moment... I'm pretty fussy with my wardrobes and I really liked how configurable the Flexi was. As an example, you could have different length rails at different heights for clothing (e.g. top rail 100cm for shirts to dresses, underneath it 50cm rail for shorts/skirts under shirts), so I feel you can fit more into it. You don't have that option with the Pax and are limited by set 50cm/75cm/100cm widths for segments of the wardrobe. I also didn't have any issues with the quality of the Flexi and I changed it around a lot, getting the right combo (and because I got bored). I'm about to do another apartment reno, and will be putting the Flexi range inside the built-ins there. Visually my concern if I hadn't used it before would be that the Flexi range looks a little cheaper than Pax, but once you have clothing and accessories in it you don't really notice. The wire shelves also don't get as dusty, which was a plus. It depends on what you're doing with the unit long term, but as a renter I also really liked how the Flexi system was configurable for my needs - whereas I wouldn't want a renter changing my Pax around!

Thx all. I think I’ve been overthinking it and a shelf with a nice edge, finishing in line with washing machine, as Kate suggested, will work. Really did like the Reno Life design, bigreader, and kiddo has promised to take both suggestions into account. I’ve given him carte blanche btw. A search for Katrina Chambers laundry bought up some ‘interesting’ but maybe less practical results tho 😉 The upper cabinet idea has much merit DairyMaid, but it’s a very narrow room, I’m short and it’s mainly to get the detergent, plant and peg box off the counter as it is for storage, but I could see for someone else it would be a great solution. Again thx, this is such a helpful community