How to Refinish Kitchen Cabinets DIY

Whether you choose ready-to-assemble or professionally installed cabinets has a significant bearing on the cost since no labor costs are involved with RTA cabinets. Specialty kitchen cabinets are a grab-bag of all of the other cabinets that aren’t classified as base, wall or tall cabinets. Popular specialty cabinets are hutches, wine racks, appliance bays and slider pull-outs. The Good Housekeeping Institute Home Improvement & Outdoor Lab provides expert reviews and advice on all things home-related, including kitchen countertops. This material is a relative newcomer to the countertop category, but we’re including it in this round-up because it’s fast becoming a favorite of designers and homeowners alike.

But exactly how you go about cleaning is a bit of a personal choice. However you choose to clean, you want to do it right and you want to use your time efficiently. A one-time roofer and a serial remodeler, Dan can often be found keeping house at his restored Brooklyn brownstone, where he lives with his wife and kids.

Required Materials for this refinish kitchen cabinets Project

Refer to your sketch to determine the distance this door will overlay the frame, and attach the corresponding mounting plate to the hinge. Paint the insides of cabinets first, then start at the top of the face frame and work down. Lay paint on quickly, then smooth it out with long, light brush strokes. Work quickly and complete an area before moving on so you’re never brushing over partially dried paint. If paint sneaks onto an area you can’t get to soon , use a rag dampened with mineral spirits to wipe the paint off. If a run or sag develops, or a hair or speck gets in the paint, let the paint dry and sand it out before recoating. Apply masking tape to the cabinet face to indicate your desired space between doors and drawers.

Framed vs. Frameless Kitchen Cabinets

Blending the sophistication of the city with rich textures, urban rustic kitchen cabinets use dark colors on base cabinets and lighter colors on wall cabinets. At 12 to 17 inches deep, wall cabinets are attached to wall studs and are elevated about 18 inches above the countertop.

Read more about Custom kitchen cabinets here.

Use the roller to apply enamel paint to the large flat surface where possible. Make sure to follow the underlying structure of the cabinet or door with the brush. Where a rail butts into a stile, for instance, paint the rail first, overlapping slightly onto the stile, then paint the stile before the overlap dries. Starting at the top of the cabinet, brush on the primer across the grain, then “tip-off”—pass the brush lightly over the wet finish in the direction of the grain. Always tip-off in a single stroke from one end to the other. As soon as it sets, remove the excess with a sharp paint scraper.

Banish grease and grime from kitchen cabinet surfaces with the right materials and techniques.

To install the cabinet on the wall, get a friend to help hold the cabinet up in place so you can drill through the back of the cabinet into the wall studs. That way, the base cabinets will not be in the way of the wall cabinet installation. Read on to learn how to install kitchen cabinets in this easy guide. Let the cabinet door maker know which brand of 35mm hinge you intend to use and ask him or her to bore the holes for you. Otherwise you’ll have to buy an expensive 35mm bit and use a drill press or jig to bore the holes. If you’re happy with the look of your old cabinets and just want to change the door style, simply measure the old doors and order new ones the same size. Have 35mm holes drilled in the back of the doors if you want to use concealed hinges like the ones we’re using.

When you‘re working with a space used as regularly as your kitchen, a painting project can be pretty disruptive. Cabinet painting pros will have everything primed, prepped, and painted in record time, minimizing downtime and hassle. Yes, the beauty of kitchen cabinets is that mismatched mugs are kept out of sight behind a door. But if your disco cabinets are just a bit too much for your liking, take the doors off completely for a fresh look. Sure, you’ll want to level up your organizational skills to keep the content of your cabinets neater, but even if you splurge on a new set of mugs, you’ll spend far less time and money this way. Calculate the chances for clean removal by looking at any paint or caulking that connect the cabinets to the walls.

The hinges we used allow the doors to be hung as little as 3/8 in. Apart, but spacing doors this close requires accuracy that’s hard to achieve on older cabinets. The closer the doors are to each other, the more visible any deviation in the spacing becomes.

When the existing finish is a clear coat, the best course of action is to strip the finish down to the bare wood before painting. This eliminates a potential adhesion problem between the old finish and the new paint.

Before you head out to the paint store, however, examine your cabinets to see if they can be resuscitated in the first place. Even the highest-quality paint job can’t revive cheap cabinets that have grown frail with age. Thin veneers peel or delaminate, particleboard cabinet bottoms or shelves sag or break, and hanging rails come loose. If these are the issues you’re dealing with, you’d actually be better off replacing your kitchen cabinets. Now all that’s left to do is install the drawer pulls and door handles . Once things start looking this good, it’s hard to resist making a few more changes. We filled the large space above the upper cabinet doors with cherry boards, and added galvanized sheet metal to the backsplash area.