Published 4 October 2026 · Updated 15 October 2026 · JIYU SDN BHD
IN SHORT
Plan how you move through the house before you plan finishes: settle the route between floors, the entrance and the kitchen first, then decide which spaces suit built-in cabinets, such as the kitchen, the wardrobes, shoe storage and the space under the stairs. If the house is older, have the concealed wiring, the pipes and any damp checked before the drawings are fixed, because cabinets will cover those walls.
A landed house gives you more room to plan than a unit, and more decisions to make before anyone draws a cabinet. A terrace house shares both side walls with its neighbours, a semi-detached house shares one wall, and a bungalow or other detached house shares none, so the same design idea behaves differently in each. This guide covers what to settle at the design stage for a double-storey terrace house, a semi-d or a bungalow in Malaysia: movement through the house, the spaces that suit built-in cabinets, and what to check in an older house. The order of site work has its own guide, so it is left out here.
Start from the walls you share, because they decide where daylight and airflow can enter. A terrace house shares its side walls with its neighbours, so windows sit at the front and the back, and the layout decides how far light and air reach into the middle of the house. A semi-detached house shares one wall, which leaves one side wall free for windows and a side entrance. A bungalow or other detached house shares no walls, so any side can take a window, and the question changes from where light can come in to how the rooms should be grouped. In a double-storey house that grouping includes deciding which rooms go upstairs. Mark the shared walls on the floor plan before you place any furniture or storage. Rooms that want daylight and a breeze, which matters in Malaysian heat, get the walls that can take windows. Walls without windows suit storage and the staircase.
Walk the house on paper before you draw a single cabinet. Trace a day in the house: groceries from the car porch to the kitchen, shoes coming off at the door, laundry travelling from the bedrooms to wherever it dries, and a guest walking from the gate to the living area. Wherever two of those routes meet in a tight spot, you have found a design problem that no finish will fix. Look hard at the staircase, because in a double-storey house it fixes where much else can go. Check where it lands upstairs: if the landing opens onto a bedroom door, plan that door and the wardrobe beside it together. Downstairs, notice how the stairs, the front door and the kitchen line up, because shoe storage, the kitchen run and the space under the stairs all compete for the same few walls. If the house has a dry kitchen inside and a wet kitchen at the back, trace the route between them too. Mark each route on a printout and show it to whoever draws your layout.
Built-in cabinets suit spaces with a fixed job or an awkward shape. The kitchen is the clearest case, because the sink, hob, appliances and pipework stay put and the cabinets are made to fit around them. Bedroom walls come next: a wardrobe can run the full length of a wall, and in a double-storey house you can plan each bedroom on its own. The entrance suits a shoe cabinet. The space under the stairs has a sloping underside, and a cabinet made to the measured slope can use room that loose furniture leaves empty. Keep loose furniture for rooms whose use may change, such as a spare room that could later become an office. Before you commit, write down who will use each cabinet and what it will hold, because that decides whether it needs hanging space, shelves, drawers or doors. These cabinets will stand in a humid climate, so find out what board each one is made of and ask for it to be named in the quotation.
Cabinets cover walls, so find out what is inside and behind those walls before the drawings are final. Ask the seller or previous owner whether the house has been rewired or re-piped, whether it has had leaks, and whether any wall has been opened or moved, and for any old drawings. Then have a qualified electrician and a plumber look at the wiring and pipes, and ask what they would change before anything is built against those walls. For damp, look and ask rather than guess. Stains on ceilings under the roof, paint peeling low on outside walls, bubbling plaster and lifting skirting are all worth pointing out to your designer, and ask what is causing them. Check the roof, gutters and back-yard drainage too, since a leak found after the cabinets are in is harder to deal with. If you want to open or move a wall, ask a qualified engineer which walls carry load, and ask the local council what has to be submitted. Then put sockets, pipes and cabinet positions on one drawing.
Describe the house in layers, from the parts that do not move to the parts you can choose. Start with the fixed points: the staircase, columns and beams, the windows and doors, the sockets and switches, the pipes and the air-conditioning trunking. Add a floor plan for each level with rough measurements written on it, plus photos of awkward corners such as the stairwell, the rear kitchen and the entrance. Then list what you want in each room: who uses it, what they store and which appliances go in. Say which walls you plan to change, if any, and bring the answers from any older-house checks so that whoever designs the cabinets knows what is hidden in the walls. Work in this order: layout first, fixed points second, cabinets third and finishes last. A finish is easy to change later, while a cabinet position is hard to alter once the boards are cut.
JIYU is not an interior design company. For homeowners, JIYU builds built-in cabinetry such as kitchen cabinets and wardrobes on ENF-grade plywood, where ENF is a formaldehyde-release grade with a limit of 0.025 mg/m³ under GB/T 39600-2021. The process has six steps: you tell us what you need, we measure on site for free, we prepare free 3D images for homeowners who are seriously considering us, we give you an itemised quotation that you confirm before you sign, the cabinets are produced to your measurements using our ENF-grade plywood, and they are installed with a technician supervising on site and walking through the handover with you. The installation team is our own. Plumbing, electrical and ceiling work are subcontracted, and JIYU is not a general renovation contractor. The board carries a 10-year one-to-one limited warranty covering manufacturing defects only: delamination, cracking not caused by external force, and moisture blistering caused by a manufacturing defect.
Should I plan the whole house at once or one floor at a time?
Settle the layout and the fixed points for the whole house at once, because the stairs, the sockets and the routes connect the floors. Building and furnishing can then follow in stages, room by room, if that suits your move-in date. A plan made one floor at a time risks a cabinet that blocks something you decide later.
Can I build a cabinet under the stairs in a terrace house?
It can be planned if the space is reachable and the underside is measured properly. Photograph the stairwell, note where the stairs start and end, and tell the cabinet maker what you want to store, so the doors and drawers can be drawn to open where there is room. If any wall or support is involved, ask a qualified engineer before the drawing is fixed.
What should I check on the cabinet drawings for a landed house?
Hold each drawing against your list of fixed points: the stair line, window and door swings, sockets, pipes and air-conditioning positions. Check that doors and drawers can open fully along the routes you traced, including the landing and the entrance. Ask to see the cabinets drawn against the real wall, in a plan view and in a 3D image if one is available, rather than as loose pieces.
Can I move the kitchen to another part of the house?
You can ask for it, but a kitchen is tied to water and waste pipes and to drainage. Ask a plumber what the new position involves before the drawing is fixed. If the kitchen stays where it is, the cabinets can be designed around the existing pipework.
JIYU SDN BHD is an ENF-grade plywood supplier based in Puchong, Selangor, Malaysia. It also builds built-in cabinetry such as kitchen cabinets and wardrobes for homeowners and installs it with its own team.
Planning a terrace house, semi-d or bungalow? WhatsApp us your floor plan, the rooms you want built-in cabinets in and, if you have them, photos of the stairs and the kitchen, and we will quote to your specification. JIYU builds kitchen cabinets, wardrobes and similar cabinetry on ENF-grade plywood and installs it with its own team. 18mm and 6mm plywood is in stock at our Puchong warehouse, and the board carries a 10-year limited warranty on manufacturing defects.
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