The Charleston Lowcountry and York County on the South Carolina side of the Charlotte metro, across Berkeley, Charleston, Lancaster and York counties. Each town below has its own permit authority and its own housing stock, and both change what the work involves.
Refacing, new cabinetry, and the worktop decision that outlives the kitchen.
Cabinets are the largest visual element in a kitchen and the most expensive thing to get wrong. The first question is whether the boxes are sound, because if they are, refacing gets most of the change for a fraction of the cost and a fraction of the disruption.
Worktops are decided at templating rather than at selection. Where the seams fall, how the pattern carries across them and how overhangs are supported are settled weeks before installation, and they are effectively permanent.
Cabinets going back into an existing layout is carpentry, and it is generally not permitted work in Charleston, North Charleston, Moncks Corner, Rock Hill, Fort Mill or Indian Land. The moment anything mechanical moves, that changes in all six. Relocating a sink or a dishwasher is plumbing; adding or moving circuits for an island, an appliance or under-cabinet lighting is electrical. Both are separately licensed trades whose permits are pulled by the contractor performing the work, in their own name.
The sequencing fact that catches people out is the same everywhere: a worktop is templated after the cabinets are set and level, not before, because the template records the kitchen as built rather than as designed. Fabrication follows the template, and the sink, tap and hob have to be chosen and on site before templating because their cut-outs are made in the shop. A change afterwards is a new slab rather than an adjustment.
If the layout does not move, there is usually nothing to permit.
Between them, the towns above fall under 6 separate permit authorities.
In the Lowcountry, permits come from the City of Charleston for Charleston, the City of North Charleston for North Charleston and the Town of Moncks Corner for Moncks Corner.
In York and Lancaster counties, from the City of Rock Hill for Rock Hill, the Town of Fort Mill for Fort Mill and Lancaster County for Indian Land.
It only matters once the layout moves. Until then a kitchen is carpentry, and no office is involved.
If it does, the plumbing and electrical permits come from the office with jurisdiction over the address, and a building official is required to refuse a permit unless the applicant produces evidence of licensure or an exemption.
Not if the cabinets go back into the existing layout. It does the moment a sink, a dishwasher, a gas point or a circuit moves.
That single decision is also the largest step change in a kitchen budget.
Because it is templated after the boxes are set and level, so the template records the kitchen as built rather than as drawn.
That gap is real, and it is why the sink and tap have to be on site before templating.
Yes — Charleston, North Charleston and Moncks Corner in the Lowcountry, and Rock Hill, Fort Mill and Indian Land in York and Lancaster counties.
The work is the same; the permit office and the association rules are not.