Are Drawer Pulls Necessary?

You may find yourself wondering if drawer pulls or cabinet knobs are completely necessary. Afterall, it’s not like you can’t open the drawer or cabinet without them. You can easily access the contents inside by just using your hands and fingers.

With this in mind, the short answer is ultimately no, they are not necessary. However, there are a few reasons they are helpful and you may want to explore their benefits before swearing them off completely.

Why aren’t they standard?

Recently many new construction homes have foregone any extra touches such as knobs and pulls. The most likely reason is that they are looking to cut costs wherever they can, especially with the current climate of rising materials costs and supply chain issues.

What are the drawbacks of not installing them?

Without a protective surface acting as a barrier between your hands and the wood surface, you could be exposing your cabinets and drawers to substances that may cause damage or wear over time such as water or oil.

What are the exceptions?

With new mechanisms such as push to open cabinet doors or automatic silent closing drawers, their necessity comes into questions even further. However the same rules apply, your kitchen or bathroom storage would be coming into more contact with water or oil due to no handle being present.

Final answer

Your cabinet or drawer won’t look rotten in a few years just because you didn’t install handles. It’s about weighing the benefits and understanding if they are something that are important to you or not.

If preservation is important to you then you may see them as more of a necessity. If you understand the risks of exposing wooden materials to the elements on a daily basis and don’t see it as a problem then they are likely not a necessity for you.

It comes down to lifestyle and preferences.