DIY Built in Triple Oven with a Wainscot Trim

The very first project we did in our house after we bought it two years ago was to finish the kitchen renovation that the previous owners had left incomplete. The kitchen has nice cabinets with glass doors, granite counter tops, and all new stainless steel appliances... except for the microwave and oven! They were the original white appliances circa 1994 when the house was built; filled with rust inside.

Now we'd spent a good amount buying and renovating the house before we'd moved in so we were a little gun shy to spend thousands more on a fancy new oven. I love cooking, so I was pretty passionate that I needed a nice model. Somehow I've never had a double oven before and I desperately wanted one. I'd coveted my mother-in-law's for years!  

Hers is a GE Single-Double Convection Wall Oven (PT925SNSS). It's the only double oven out there that is small enough to fit in the space of a single oven. We were pulling out a single oven so my dreams of a double oven were limited to this particular model. And it cost $3,000 two years ago!     

I looked in all the classic stores: Sears, Rodenbaugh's (at least in Allen it's a classic), Lowes, Home Depot, etc. but they all had the same price! Finally I turned to Craigslist, Typed in the model #, and held my breath,

drum roll...................................

Score! Someone really had recently purchased the exact PT925SNSS double oven I wanted in stainless steel!! The sellers were renovating their kitchen. when half way through they changed direction and it had been too long since purchase to be allowed to return it to the store. They sold it to me for HALF the price! I mean it was full-on still wrapped in plastic and in the shipping box - brand brand new.
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We snatched it up and brought it home in the back of our truck. The next step was to find the matching microwave. The old microwave we were pulling out was a built in above the oven; it would have to fit into the wall. 

I found the matching microwave, the PEB1590SM2SS, but come to find out - it was discontinued 2 years ago! No one carried it anymore! Which was a huge bummer, because this thing was a dual microwave oven/convection oven!! Seriously - you can pull out the glass rotating plate, put in the metal shelf and poof - it's a third oven!!!

Mind blown right!! A THIRD oven! But none of that matters... because it's discontinued. Gone. Unavailable. What's a girl to do?

Not give up! That's what! So again I turned to Craigslist and searched for my microwave. It took a while but I really did find it on Craiglist! It was.for sale at a consignment shop about an hour away. So we made the drive and purchased it for pennies on the dollar- well for $200 anyway (and it was over $1K new). It was another huge score. Not quite perfect this time though - the front door had a good amount of scratches on it. I called GE Appliances and I was able to order a replacement door for like $50; so still a steal!

We also had to buy the built-in trim kit in order to install the microwave into the wall for $264 which brought the total price to $500. Still a bona fide steal and a huge stroke of luck to find the one matching microwave left. 

INSTALL TIME!

Pulling the old oven and microwave out was the easy part. 

The hard part ended up being that the previous owner hadn't hardwired the microwave in, and we had to install a higher voltage outlet. Or I should say, we had to hire an electrician to add a higher voltage outlet within the wall space. That cost $150, but it was totally worth it (and necessary).

​Next,  

Now came time to finally install our fancy (but cheap) triple oven!! Challie still ended up having to use a saw to widen the hole. He then built a shelf to hold the microwave because it was a different fit/size than the last one. 

​Using the built-in trim kit Challie was able to mount the microwave/convection oven into the wall above our double oven. 

The oven slid in pretty easily. The hardest part was the final framing. It wasn't a perfect fit so we had to hide some a gap at the bottom and bridge the new gap between the oven and microwave. 

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We cut out a strip of wainscoting beadboard and added a picture frame around the whole thing. We used wood filler to perfect any imperfections. All that was left was to slap some ivory paint on there and had a P.A..R...T....Y!!! Challie deserves all the credit on this one. 

Now for anyone wondering, the ovens all work AWESOME. I've cooked a huge turkey in the bottom oven that came out perfectly. I've run all three ovens at the same time and cooked dinner in NO TIME. Holidays are fun using these appliances. I use the smaller middle oven the most- anything that goes on a baking sheet. It heats up in no time and uses half the energy of a full sized oven. 

It's been two years and I still love love love my triple oven. I do want to make a final note to say that I'm actually planning on stopping the use of microwaves in my family. Standby for an update on weaning ourselves off radiation heating which destroys the nutrition in our food. Challie will have a hard time with that one... but I'll get him to come around.