Center rail on shaker doors

[ASingleQuestion]

Hello,

I'm building kitchen doors for myself and I was wondering if I need to put a center/middle rain on shaker doors. They're around 42 inch (around 106cm) in height and 14 inch (36cm) wide.

I'm building them out of MDF. I'd build it from wood but I don't have access to a jointer/planer.

[Chet]

I think it is more of an aesthetic choice you have to make.  I re-did our kitchen cabinet doors a few years back when we did a facelift on the kitchen.  I used a shaker style door also.

[wtnhighlander]

I agree with @Chet, that this is mostly a question of aesthetics, that only you can answer. However, I'll offer my personal opinion that at the 3:1 ratio of height to width, they might look better with a dividing rail. Also personal opinion, I would NOT divide evenly. I generally like the look of vertical paneled doors with the upper panel longer than the lower. A ratio of 5 units above to 4 units below is a good starting point.

[ASingleQuestion]

Thank you for the comments, I appreciate it.

[BillyJack]

If you have full length doors over 36” it’s common to use a center rail..

[BillyJack]

My daughter has full length on her upper doors. In my opinion it should be Broke  into smaller sections..

[roughsawn]

Anyone have a picture of a shaker style cabinet door, with a center rail? That you'd care to share?

[BillyJack]

On 8/5/2024 at 11:48 AM, roughsawn said:

Anyone have a picture of a shaker style cabinet door, with a center rail? That you'd care to share?

I’ll have to look…

will this work?

 

[BillyJack]

Center stiles, etc doesn’t have any structural gain to the door, but adds detail…

[roughsawn]

Thank you. Don't know that I've seen that anywhere.

[BillyJack]

Many doors are divided in half with a center stile. Hopefully when I redo mine, I’ll divide mine somehow.