What it is called, by market
One concept, four markets. Where a name means something else locally, the card says so rather than leaving you to find out on site.
United Kingdom
Same word, different thingplinth
also kickboard, kick board, plinth block, base course
Also the projecting base of a wall or column, and a PLINTH BLOCK is a third thing again — the small block at the foot of an architrave where it meets the skirting.
Australia
Close, not identicalkickboard
also plinth, toe kick, kicker
Kickboard is the standard joinery term, which keeps it separate from the architectural plinth in a way British usage does not.
United Statesyours
Close, not identicaltoe kick
also toekick, kick plate, plinth, base
TOE KICK names the kitchen component specifically and PLINTH is reserved for the architectural base, so the two senses do not collide. A KICK PLATE on a door is a fourth thing.
Canada
Close, not identicaltoe kick
also kick, base, plinth
As the United States, with the same separation between the joinery and the architectural senses.
The governing standard, by market
United Kingdom
BS 6222 / Approved Document M
Domestic kitchen equipment dimensional requirements, and access to and use of buildings including approach and reach at fittings.
United States
ANSI/KCMA A161.1 / ADA 804
Performance and construction standard for kitchen cabinets, and accessible kitchens including clear floor space and knee and toe clearance.
Calculators for this
Each works in either measurement system, and the terminology on the page follows whichever market you have selected.
Frequently asked questions
- Why is there a recess under kitchen units at all?
- So you can stand close enough to work at the worktop without your toes hitting the cabinet, which is exactly what the American name says and the British one does not. Standing upright at a bench, a person's feet extend forward of their body; without a recess they have to stand back, which puts the worktop further from them and pushes them into a forward lean for every task. The recess is typically around 100 mm deep and 150 mm high, and those dimensions are not arbitrary — accessibility guidance in both markets specifies toe clearance, and in an accessible kitchen the requirement extends to knee clearance under at least one working position, which is a much deeper recess and changes the cabinetry rather than just the board.
- Why is the plinth a separate removable piece rather than part of the carcass?
- Because it has three jobs the carcass cannot do, and all three need it to come off. It has to be SCRIBED to the floor, which is never level, so it is cut to fit on site after the units are levelled on their legs — a fixed base would either rock or leave a wedge-shaped gap. It has to be REMOVABLE for access to the legs, to a water leak, to a dishwasher's feet and to whatever has rolled under there. And it has to be SEALED at the floor in a wet area, which is a bead that occasionally needs renewing. That is also why a plinth left off, or one with its seal failed, is such a reliable entry for water into a kitchen floor: the gap behind it is open to the whole run.
- What is a plinth block, and why did it exist?
- It is a small block of timber, thicker and usually wider than both, set at the foot of a door architrave where the architrave meets the skirting. It exists because those two mouldings are different thicknesses and different profiles, and joining them directly means scribing one complex shape onto another at a point that takes knocks, gets cleaned and gets kicked. The plinth block takes both: the architrave dies onto its top, the skirting dies onto its side, and neither has to be scribed to the other. It is also more durable at exactly the height where a vacuum cleaner and a mop live. It largely disappeared with simpler mouldings and returned with period restoration, and it is a third meaning of a word that already had two.