But Ikea wants to reduce that waste in the best way it knows how: through furniture design. The Swedish company has engineered kitchen cabinets that are made from recycled plastic bottles and wood.

Cabinets: IKEA bases with IKEA EKESTAD and KUNGSBACKA fronts and the Handle Studio Matt Black aluminum pulls. “There are all these companies that do bespoke fronts for IKEA units, but we just ...

While Ikea and Form Us With Love used trash to make a functional kitchen, you would never know it by looking at the design. The cabinet fronts, colored in matte, anthracite grey, are elegant, too.

When Molly Miller moved into her new house last summer, the kitchen was dark, with black countertops and only one small window. And, “it had beautiful, early 2000s cabinetry,” she says.

Ikea’s kitchen cabinets, in particular, lend themselves well to hacking; their doors and side panels can be swapped out with ease. More importantly, the internal hardware is top quality. “There’s a ...