A kitchen is the most disruptive room in a house to renovate and the most expensive per square foot, because almost everything in it is either plumbed, wired, vented or load-bearing. Which is exactly why it is drawn to the millimetre before anything comes out.
Before the finishes
Nobody goes looking for a contractor in the abstract. These are the three things we hear first, and what we do about each of them.
Sink, hob and fridge placed for the cook, then the route everybody else takes through the room laid over it.
Seating, prep, storage or a sink — an island that does none of them is a table you cannot move.
Whether the wall carries load, what it costs to take out, and whether the room is actually better without it.
Deep drawers on full-extension runners hold more and reach further than a base cabinet with a shelf in it.
Taken to the ceiling where the room allows, with the awkward top shelf given a purpose.
Tray storage, appliance garage, bin runs and cutlery sized to your kitchen rather than to a standard.
Cabinetry, stone and floor chosen to last. Colour and pattern go where they are cheap to change.
The single most-skipped item, and the one that keeps a kitchen feeling new.
Task, ambient and accent on separate circuits, so the room works at seven in the morning and at eight at night.
Three ways to do it
Layout first, then cabinetry, stone and light. These three are the same trades in three different moods — the photographs are references for a treatment rather than our own projects, so bring us the one you keep coming back to.
Our process
Six stages, in order, with what you get at the end of each one. Nothing here starts until the stage before it is finished and signed off — which is the whole reason the schedule holds.
We look at the room you have: where the services run, which walls are structural, where the light comes from and how you actually use the space. Most of what a kitchen will cost is decided by things visible on this visit.
A frank read on what is easy, what is expensive, and what is not worth doing.
Two or three plans against how you cook — where you land shopping, where the bin goes, who else is in the room while you work. Appliance sizes and clearances are set here, because they decide the cabinetry.
A dimensioned plan, elevations of every run, and appliance schedule.
Cabinetry, stone, tile, fittings and lighting chosen against dates rather than whenever they come up. Stone is picked from the actual slab, not a sample chip — veining varies and a photograph will not tell you.
A written selections schedule with a decision date against each line.
Gas, water, waste, circuits and ventilation moved to suit the new plan and drawn before a wall opens. Extraction is sized to the hob and ducted outside; a recirculating hood in a serious kitchen is a compromise, not a solution.
A services drawing, and a permit where the work needs one.
Out to the substrate, then framing, services and any structural work. This is when surprises appear in an older house, and when having drawings means a surprise is a decision rather than a delay.
Weekly photographs and a schedule position you can see.
Cabinets set and scribed to the walls the house actually has. Stone is templated after the boxes are in — never before — then fabricated, and the room is finished around it.
A snag walk before we call it done, and the list closed with you.
What’s included
Need inspiration?
Bring us the pictures you keep coming back to and our designers take it from there — working from the exterior style of the house, its proportions, its era and its materials, so every room reads as part of the same building rather than a set of separate good ideas.
One vision, carried through, inside and out. The image here is a reference for a treatment, not a photograph of one of our own projects.
Talk to a designer →What it takes
The figure under each level is where that scope typically starts in the Charlotte market — a starting point, not a quote. What follows is the work those numbers buy: what falls inside each level, in the order the decisions actually get made. The same three names run through our finish levels below, because the two questions — how much work, and to what standard — are answered together.
Starting at$120k
Starting at$180k
Starting at$225k
Same Queen Boss craftsmanship at every level. Scope and finish are what move the number, never quality of workmanship — and you get an exact figure for your own project after the walk-through and the drawings, not before.
Define the finish
Two rooms of exactly the same size can cost dramatically different amounts, and the difference is selections. Cabinetry, countertops, tile, fixtures, lighting, appliances, doors, trim and hardware all move the number. These three tiers give us a shared language, so when you say “a $50,000 kitchen” we can talk immediately about what that realistically includes.
A clean, well-built home using quality builder-grade materials — the right choice when maximising budget toward square footage and structure matters most.
Upgraded materials and brands throughout that elevate everyday livability and long-term durability — without moving into full custom pricing.
A full custom finish package with premium brands, natural materials, and designer detailing — built for clients who want the home to be a showpiece.
Per square foot, finishes only — excludes land, site work and structural. Same Queen Boss craftsmanship at every tier: the difference is customisation and material investment, never quality of workmanship.
Pre-construction investment
| Pre-construction stage | Scope | Investment |
|---|---|---|
| 1 — Design & Architectural | Complete plan set: layouts, selections, construction drawings & renderings | $2,000 – $4,000 |
| 2 — Structural Engineering | Site evaluation, calculations & engineer’s stamp (if required) | $2,000 – $4,000 |
| 3 — City Permit | Plan submission & city stamp · permit fees billed at cost | At cost |
| Total pre-construction | Final range confirmed once scope & areas are set | $2,000 – $8,000+ |
Design, engineering and permit are priced separately from the build, so you can stop at any stage with a set of drawings you own outright.
Financing
A renovation is usually worth more than the house was before it. RenoFi is built on that: their lending partners underwrite against your home’s after-renovation value rather than what it is worth today, which is why the number they can reach is so often larger than a standard home-equity offer.
RenoFi is not a lender; it works with lending partners who make the loans. Queen Boss Construction is not a lender or a broker, does not arrange credit and takes no part in the application or the decision — we point you at them because clients keep asking who to talk to. All terms, rates and eligibility are between you and the lender.
What moves the number
We do not publish prices, because a price quoted before the drawings exist is a number that changes. These are the four things that decide it, so you know what you are choosing between.
Relocating a sink or a run of waste means new falls and sometimes a new stack. It is the single most common reason a kitchen budget moves.
A structural opening needs an engineer, a beam and a permit. Worth doing, worth knowing about at week one rather than week six.
Made-to-measure fits the room you have and costs what it costs. Catalogue boxes cost less and need fillers where the walls are not square.
Slab, thickness, edge detail and how many seams. A waterfall end on a large island is a second slab before it is anything else.
In their words
Robert is a great communicator and we love working with him and his team.
Adam Peter S.They are always professional and strive to provide exemplary customer service.
Shannon L.Common questions
For a full renovation, expect the room to be out of use from strip-out to second fix. We set a date before we start, tell you every week whether it still holds, and can usually rig a temporary sink and worktop elsewhere in the house.
Yes. We will review their drawings, tell you what the house and the code will actually allow, and price the work from them.
You have to have chosen them. Cabinetry is drawn around exact appliance dimensions, so the models are fixed at design stage even if they are delivered much later.
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A conversation and a walk through the rooms you are thinking about — no charge, and no obligation at the end of it.
