Kitchen and bathroom cabinets

I dont know of any close to there,
but here are a lot of fine low cost wood in the Philippines as e g mahogany, acacia mangium (="white teak") something called "Filipino rosewood" which I have forgot the name of, and there are many other hardwood types in the Philippines, although several are rare by few get cut permit for many of the indigenous tree types.

Some harder to find good carpenters, but there are cheap such.   You can ask around localy and check their done jobs.
One sourse can be smaller businesses, which make finer furniture. Rather many such make good quality. If they can make good quality free standing cabinets, then I suppouse good chance they can make good kitchen cabinets too   

Michaelm54 wrote:

We're building a house in Eastern Zamboanga del Norte. Im looking for high quality kitchen and bathroom cabinets as well as some household furniture. I remember in the middle of a long thread someone talking about fine woods in Cagayan de Oro, which is close enough to us. I could be completely mistaken because i wasnt that interested at the time and just a faint recolection.

Let me know if by chance anyone knows who was talking about it.

I had a custom dresser made by locals, they were furniture makers. The construction was done at my house. Labor was reasonable, quality was better than any furniture company.

The rare or finer wood you are probably looking for is either Narra, Gmelina, or Mahogany.  in my opinion the best wood carpenters in Mindanao are over by Kitaotao, or Buda. I am assuming your talking about wardrobes or Filipinos call them closets.  for a Narra  closet your looking around 25k-35k Mahogany 22k-35k, and Gmelina 15k-25k.  In my opinion I would go with Gmelina. It is a light weight hardwood that wont split very easily.  I have 3 Narra doors on my house and 2 of them are already splitting, but they weigh a ton and they are extremely strong. You couldn't kick through them if you tried.  The really hard part is finding a decent carpenter.  When your out shopping take a Filipino friend with you and don't show you face till after the prices are set then look at the products WITHOUT PAINT FIRST.  and make sure you tell the carpenter you want to see the product prior to being painted and mark the closet with a engraving stamp that is only in your possession.  This will guarantee that your getting the product you looked at, and so you know your getting hardwood, not plywood. Get prices first from your friend because as soon as they see you the price will double maybe even triple.  I got a engraving stamp made from a local machine shop cost me 300 pesos.  I know it sounds like I am paranoid, but I got majorly ripped off on buying two bed frames.  they were supposed to made of Gmelina and they were made mostly of plywood. but with paint you could not tell. they will spend a lot of money on wood filler and you will never know

>Bukidninkane

But why paint hardwood??        Cabinets can be made in different collors by chosing different wood types, so good quality cabinets dont need paint (except perhaps transparent varnish.)

Thanks for feedback it confirms what i was thinking. The doors we had made for our farm house of Gmelina are nice and quite heavy with heavy duty hinges. Im still impressed 4 years later. The  cabinets are a different story, they are okay but i want much better in our new beach house. We will put the considerable family feelers out. Dipolog City is our nearby city and I was looking for a good excuse to take a trip to Cagayan.