Painting Your Kitchen Cabinets

Bring out the paint bucket and paint brush! It's time to get a new look in your kitchen!

Now, it really isn't quite that simple. You need to take the cabinet doors off and remove the hardware, for example. But painting your kitchen cabinets can be one of the most affordable ways to refresh the look of your kitchen.

That doesn't mean it's an easy way to refresh your kitchen, however. There's a lot of work involved in putting a coat of paint onto your cabinets that will last a reasonable length of time.

If at all possible, you are best off stripping or sanding down the finish on your cabinets after you have taken the doors and hardware off. If your doors have all kinds of details, this can be pretty difficult, but it's vital to the finished result. Yes, you can try a product such as liquid sandpaper to degloss the finish, but that solution really isn't as good as sanding. Make sure to mark the doors so you can easily put them back where they were.

Fill all holes, nicks and dings so that you'll have the best possible finished product. You don't want a putty that will shrink as it dries or your finished product won't be as smooth as you might like.

It's a good idea to use a good quality primer after sanding. You will probably want to use an oil-based primer if it is available in your area. The reason for this is quite simple; many stains and varnishes are also oil-based, and so the oil-based primer will stick better. Think about how oil and water don't mix and you'll get something of the idea. Oil smells worse and the cleanup is more difficult than when you deal with water-based products, but we're looking for good results here. Oil primers also do better at blocking the old stain from showing through.

However, you can get away with a latex paint on top of an oil-based primer. Primers are made for paint to stick to, after all! You'll have to decide for yourself which you want to use. Oil paints are typically stronger, so they do have an advantage in a hard-use area such as a kitchen. However, if you go with a gloss, or at the very least a semi gloss latex (do NOT use a satin or flat finish in a kitchen - too hard to clean and they won't last!), even latex paint will last reasonably well in a kitchen. Each of these has the advantage of being fairly scrubbable and cope well with the grease that all kitchens produce over time.

One thing we haven't discussed is paint brushes. Trust me and do not go cheap with your paint brushes. It will make a difference! No foam brushes! No rollers! If you want the best possible results, you'll either stick with good quality brushes or maybe even a sprayer.

Now, since you've filled the old hardware holes, you can easily replace your hardware. You probably won't find two-hole handles that exactly fit the old holes, so expect that you will need to drill new holes. Call it motivation for doing a good job on filling in the old holes. New hardware will really add that finishing touch to your kitchen's new look.

Even though you're painting your kitchen because remodeling or refacing costs too much, don't go cheap on your supplies. It's better to spend a little extra and get good tools and good paint now than it is to have to redo the whole thing in a couple years because the cheap paint looks terrible already. Kitchens get too much use for low quality paints to last.