I have previously written about painted cabinets in my blog, but usually I paint cabinets for homeowners who decide to extend the life of their existing cabinets by facelifting them with a paint job. My most recent client also wanted to spruce up her existing cabinets – but in this case it was to make the house more appealing for sale!
My client Paula is a realtor who will be putting her own home on the market in the spring. Paula’s kitchen cabinets were in very good shape – but she knows from experience that their dark cherry color is not what home-buyers want these days! The trend in cabinets is to go with a painted finish, and Paula knows that having a kitchen that is in line with design trends helps to sell the house.
The kitchen has 2 banks of cabinets, and one half of the kitchen had newer cabinets that already had a painted finish in a slightly warm off-white. To keep the kitchen cohesive, we chose a color that matched this perfectly.
With the color chosen, I was on to my usual process. I first remove the cabinet doors (making sure to label everything carefully to make sure everything goes back together correctly!). I paint the doors in my studio and the frames on-site. All parts of the cabinets get scrubbed to remove dirt and grease, and then sanded to remove the sheen (shininess) of the old finish. Doing this helps to make sure the next step – the primer – sticks for the long haul. When the primer is dry, that gets sanded as well to make it nice and smooth and to also help bond with the paint. Finally, I move on the paint – using a specialty cabinet paint that dries hard and flat for a durable and smooth finish. This gets 2 coats with another sanding in between to help make certain the final finish is as durable as possible!
Often, I work with cabinets that have more wear than Paula’s did – and I can anticipate the improvements before I even start. With this job, I was surprised at how much the paint improved the kitchen! Paula was thrilled as well, noting how brighter the space was with the white cabinets, and how updated and modern the kitchen looked!
Below are some of the "before" and "after" shots of this project - enjoy!
Before
After
