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OP, yes, I agree with you that 36 is considered the standard width for a full size fridge for either a side by side or a french door. Yes, you can find smaller widths but of course those have smaller capacity as well. I personally would not consider buying a smaller fridge for a family. I did get a counter depth which knocks out some of the capacity but with an open floor plan, I knew it would bother me to much to have the fridge sticking out too far.
I hope there is a fairly easy fix for you to add enough room to easily fit the fridge you want.
I got a smaller French door fridge with a drawer freezer. It actually held quite a bit because the doors were really roomy and would hold all of my taller items. I could fit like a large jar of fruit water in the door shelf, a brita, an orange juice, water, etc. That really freed up the shelves for a lot of the shorter items. I think the key is just finding a nice smaller fridge that maximizes the interior space. I had a narrow galley kitchen where my washer/dryer were also across the way, so I really needed a smaller fridge with French doors. The traditional French door setup loses a lot of space, but with the freezer below, you don’t lose space in the fridge area and can still store wide items.
Sorry, I’m not talking about the small fridges people generally get for apartments or as a spare fridge for the garage, I need something that’s side by side or french door (we are a family of 5, frequently have guests over and I like to cook), counter depth because our fridge is literally right in front of the stove/island area (the configuration of our kitchen is was a very interesting choice on the part of the builder). If you look on the Home Depot site, the options under 2K are all between 35.7-36” wide. Vast majority are 35.75”. Heck, even the 3K options are in that range. The guys at Home Depot and Lowes looked over almost all their inventory.
As I always like to say...you can never have too much garage space. Well, the same applies to refrigerators. We have a 29 sq ft refrigerator and it's barely adequate for the two of us. I wouldn't settle for a smaller unit. I'd be more inclined to make the opening bigger, if for no other reason to allow air to flow better, which allows heat to better dissipate from the condenser coils.
I got a smaller French door fridge with a drawer freezer. It actually held quite a bit because the doors were really roomy and would hold all of my taller items. I could fit like a large jar of fruit water in the door shelf, a brita, an orange juice, water, etc. That really freed up the shelves for a lot of the shorter items. I think the key is just finding a nice smaller fridge that maximizes the interior space. I had a narrow galley kitchen where my washer/dryer were also across the way, so I really needed a smaller fridge with French doors. The traditional French door setup loses a lot of space, but with the freezer below, you don’t lose space in the fridge area and can still store wide items.
Yes, I like the french door option, the side by side isn’t my favorite since we currently have that and can’t fit a pizza box comfortably into the fridge section and the freezer is underutilized, but at this rate, I’m looking at the side by side as well, was hoping there was a decently priced and well reviewed dupe of our current fridge. Might have to call Whirlpool and see what they have, now that I think about it. I don’t want to go too small because than there are gapes to fill up in the cabinetry. I wish they had just made that opening 1/2 inch larger on the bottom and the cabinet didn’t taper down! But oh well, I’m going to have to look at some of the suggestions that folks have given about cutting into the particle board.
I got this side by side, which I mostly like but I got it because I don't really like the freezer space of a french door and it's also significantly less freezer space esp. in a counter depth.
I like to batch cook and also stock up on things on sale, so I needed the extra freezer and ended up getting a second freezer in the garage. So I could have made do with the pull out freezer of a french door and had the benefit of the full width of the fridge section. It usually isn't that big a deal - for pizza, we typically go out rather than get take out, and even though I bring home leftovers, instead of putting them flat in the large size pizza box, I stack the individual slices in a smaller box that fits into my fridge.
I really like the Food Showcase door. At first I thought it was a gimmick but it's really helped me keep things more organized, with a lot less "out of sight, out of mind" where I lose track of the food and it ends up going back.
I got this side by side, which I mostly like but I got it because I don't really like the freezer space of a french door and it's also significantly less freezer space esp. in a counter depth.
I like to batch cook and also stock up on things on sale, so I needed the extra freezer and ended up getting a second freezer in the garage. So I could have made do with the pull out freezer of a french door and had the benefit of the full width of the fridge section. It usually isn't that big a deal - for pizza, we typically go out rather than get take out, and even though I bring home leftovers, instead of putting them flat in the large size pizza box, I stack the individual slices in a smaller box that fits into my fridge.
I really like the Food Showcase door. At first I thought it was a gimmick but it's really helped me keep things more organized, with a lot less "out of sight, out of mind" where I lose track of the food and it ends up going back.
That’s essentially the type of side by sides I’ve been looking at, there’s a similar LG one at this price point I liked as well, but they’re both 35.9”. Carpenter said he can come in the morning, I’m really hoping we can widen the space by 1/2 inch or so! I’m liking the idea of getting rid of that right hand vertical panel, so that there isn’t a width constraint for any bigger appliances.
From the pix it looks like the vertical piece to the right of the fridge is just a piece of 3/4" particleboard with plastic film adhered to it to give the finish. If the one on the left is the same, you won't be able to do much to widen the opening.
How is the cabinet above the fridge attached? If you could securely attach it to the wall studs, maybe you could just cut that vertical piece (and maybe the one on the left too) totally away below the cabinet, and then just paint the raw edge left. Then you no longer have to keep the fridge width within narrow limits.
I’ll have my husband take a look, I’m not sure. I don’t think it would be a problem to attach to the wall, we don’t put anything into the cabinet, it’s purely decorative.
You should be able to remove the right side panel entirely. If the upper cabinet is unfinished on that side, cut the removed panel to fit to cover the end of the cabinet.
Fridge replacement is the worst. What we've done in the past is put the fridge where we wanted it and put something else in the designated but too small and awkward spot. In that house our fridge door wouldn't open fully - It hit the island. So we put a dresser in that spot and moved the fridge between the breakfast area and kitchen.
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