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CWS Construction in San Francisco, CA | Workshop Contractors
We’re Workshop Contractors, and we provide independent CWS cabinet installation, repair, and full-kitchen service across San Francisco. We’re not a CWS dealer or warranty representative. What sets our CWS work apart here is that we sequence cabinet installation around the city’s mandatory soft-story retrofit ordinance and the out-of-level floor lines common in 1880s to 1930s Victorians and Edwardians. Call (844) 384-3361 for a free estimate.
Why San Francisco Residents Choose Us for CWS Service
Most San Francisco kitchens are not square. The walls are plaster and lath, the floors have settled over a century of fog and fill, and the cabinet openings were framed before anyone used a laser level. Our crews have fitted our CWS services into those rooms for years. We know how a CWS door hangs on an out-of-plumb wall in the Richmond, how a base cabinet twists when the floor drops two inches toward the rear yard in Noe Valley, and how to shim, scribe, and fur so the reveal at the window casing stays clean. Noel Figueroa, our owner and general contractor, grew up learning finish work from the tradesmen who built his childhood street in Ontario, California. He has carried that standard into every San Francisco job we run: square framing, flush doors, drawers that track cleanly. We use genuine CWS replacement parts when they’re available and equal-grade aftermarket hardware only when the OEM part is discontinued. You get one contractor, one schedule, and one team accountable for how the cabinets, counters, plumbing, and tile all meet.
Styles & brands we work with
Common CWS Construction Problems We Solve in San Francisco
- Twisted base cabinets from settled foundations. Soft-story and hillside Edwardian foundations go out of level, so CWS cabinet boxes twist and doors ride open or drag on the frame once installed. We re-level to the true floor line before mounting, not after.
- Swollen doors and sides from fog-belt humidity. Kitchens in San Francisco’s marine layer run damp, especially below sinks and around dishwashers. CWS particleboard and MDF door cores absorb that moisture and warp. We replace the damaged fronts and address the ventilation or leak that caused it.
- Uneven reveals against old plaster walls. Lot-line Victorians rarely have plumb framing. If you mount a CWS ready-to-assemble box flat against the wall, the gap at the window casing shows. We scribe and fur each box so the reveal stays consistent.
- Worn hinges and slides on heavy doors. Original CWS hinges and slides fatigue fast when doors carry solid-wood or glass fronts, and drawers loaded with cookware sag or leave the track. We swap in genuine CWS hardware or a matched equal-grade replacement.
- Water damage in basement-garage kitchens. In Noe Valley and Bernal Heights, rear-yard and basement kitchens are cut into the slope. Water wicking through the foundation wall reaches the lower CWS cabinets before anyone sees the leak. We repair the moisture path first, then replace the boxes.
CWS Service in San Francisco: What Local Conditions Mean for Your Equipment
San Francisco has more than 1,700 pre-1906 wood-frame Victorians and Edwardians still standing, and most sit on unreinforced brick foundations in liquefaction-prone fill. The city’s Ordinance 66-15 requires soft-story retrofits on thousands of those buildings. That mandate directly shapes the CWS work we do here. A retrofit lifts and re-levels the floor line, often by an inch or more, after the shear wall goes in. If you install CWS cabinet runs before the retrofit, everything mounts to the old slope. After the retrofit, doors bind, drawers misalign, and the counter seams open up. We regularly re-set CWS kitchen and bath runs after the foundation and shear-wall upgrade is complete. No neighboring city in the region has the same citywide retrofit mandate driving that sequencing. That sequencing is the difference between a cabinet run that stays square and one you fight with for a decade.
CWS Models & Products We Service in San Francisco
We work across the CWS range: ready-to-assemble and assembled base, wall, and tall units; semi-custom kitchen cabinets with standard and staggered box depths; bath vanity lines with matching linen and storage cabinets; and door and drawer fronts in painted MDF, thermofoil, and veneer finishes. For a single failed box on an aged CWS run, we repair. When a full 1980s or 1990s CWS kitchen shows water-swollen boxes, mismatched doors, and worn slides, we recommend refacing or replacement rather than chasing parts. We keep common CWS hinges, slides, and touch-up kits on our trucks, which keeps most San Francisco repairs moving without waiting on a distribution run. We buy genuine CWS replacement doors and drawers directly when a match exists; when the OEM part is discontinued or back-ordered, we use equal-grade aftermarket hardware and tell you exactly what you’re getting and why.
See the difference
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AfterCWS Service Pricing in San Francisco
What you’ll pay depends on the scope: a simple hinge and slide swap costs far less than a full kitchen with scribed cabinets, counters, and plumbing. The table below shows current price ranges for the CWS-related work we do in San Francisco. Every free estimate includes a walkthrough, measurements, and a written line-item quote, so you see the material and labor split before signing anything.
| Service | Price Range |
|---|---|
| Kitchen Remodel | $16,520 – $53,100 |
| Small Kitchen Remodel | $10,620 – $23,600 |
| Cabinet Installation | $4,720 – $15,340 |
| Countertop Installation | $2,360 – $7,670 |
| Backsplash Installation | $945 – $2,950 |
| Kitchen Island Installation | $3,540 – $11,800 |
| Bathroom Vanity Installation | $945 – $3,540 |
| Bathroom Remodel | $10,620 – $33,040 |
Call (844) 384-3361 for an exact quote. Estimates are free, and the number is fixed once we agree on the line items.
Serving San Francisco, CA — Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the San Francisco area and know this community well. Use the map below to see our service coverage — if you’re nearby, we can almost certainly help.
FAQs – CWS Construction in San Francisco
No. We are an independent general contractor that installs, repairs, and replaces CWS cabinets. We work to the manufacturer’s spec, but we are not a CWS dealer, authorized service provider, or warranty representative. Any warranty claim on the product itself goes through the manufacturer. Our workmanship carries our own accountability, and we stand behind how the cabinets are installed.
Yes, and we do it regularly. The key is not forcing the boxes flat against the wall. Old Victorians and Edwardians have plaster, settled framing, and floors that slope toward the rear. We shim, scribe, and fur each CWS box to the actual wall and floor line, so the doors close flush and the reveals stay even. That’s what makes a CWS install look like it belongs in a century-old room instead of fighting it. Call (844) 384-3361 for a free estimate.
It depends on how far the moisture has traveled. If the doors are swollen but the boxes and subfloor are sound, we replace the fronts and fix the leak or ventilation issue that caused it. If the sink leak rotted the cabinet floor and the subfloor beneath, which we see often in San Francisco’s fog-damp kitchens, the repair scope grows. In a Noe Valley Edwardian, our crew pulled a water-swollen 1990s CWS base-cabinet run and found the leak had rotted the cabinet floor and the floor below. We rebuilt the base with new CWS boxes and moisture-resistant substrate after the plumbing was repaired, then re-leveled and scribed to the out-of-plumb plaster wall. The doors now close flush and the drawers track cleanly.
It should. San Francisco’s Ordinance 66-15 requires soft-story retrofits on thousands of older wood-frame buildings, and the retrofit lifts and re-levels the floor line. If you install CWS cabinets before the retrofit, everything mounts to the old slope. After the retrofit, doors bind and counters separate. We sequence the cabinet work after the structural work wherever possible. If the retrofit is already done, we level to the post-retrofit floor. Call (844) 384-3361 and we’ll tell you where your project sits in that sequence.
Yes. Hillside basement-garage kitchens in Mission District and Bernal Heights are cut into the slope, and the walls wick moisture. We check the foundation-wall condition and drainage before mounting any CWS boxes. If water is getting through, we fix that path first, then install with a moisture break behind the run. Otherwise the new cabinets will fail the same way the old ones did.
Service Areas Near San Francisco
We serve San Francisco and the surrounding area, including CWS service in Chinatown, CWS service in Tiburon, and the communities around them. For the broader region, see our San Francisco service area page. We also work across the bay and down the peninsula, wherever the job takes us.
Book Your CWS Service in San Francisco Today
If your CWS cabinets are binding, swollen, or just never fit the way they should in your San Francisco home, call (844) 384-3361. We’ll schedule a walkthrough, take measurements, and give you a written quote. Build it right the first time. The second time costs twice as much and nobody’s happy about it.
Written by Noel Figueroa, Owner at Workshop Contractors, serving San Francisco since 2008.