Let’s Paint the Kitchen Cabinets!

When we moved into our home, all the baseboards, cabinets, bathroom vanities, door trim, and doors in the house were the same light oak color. Now, I love oak! I love the look of the grain and I am usually drawn to the light oak color. And, because I love oak, I just enjoyed the woodwork for several years….until one day when I just decided to make some changes. Today, there is very little of the light oak color left in the house. Just a bit of accent in the kitchen on the cabinet doors and the drawers.

Since our home is not a custom-built one, the oak I’m referring to is not high quality. I do have a bit of heartburn when I consider painting a piece of real hardwood but in this case, that wasn’t an issue. Here are pics of the wood we had in the house.

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Decision to paint

It was a hot August weekend when I decided to paint the kitchen cabinets. I have to admit, I was a bit nervous about painting them. What if I hated them? Was it going to be messy? Take forever? Did I need to sand off the finish or maybe even use stripper? I hate using stripper! I have found that the one I’ve used recently (see Products I love – Painting) is the best I’ve tried for being non-toxic but using stripper is still messy.

I figured it would be best to start with the drawers and cabinet doors so I could determine if a simple sanding would prepare the surface for paint or if I would need to break out the stripper – please tell me that won’t be needed! I removed the doors from the hardware on the cabinets and took the drawers out of their spaces. Then I removed all the hardware – hinges, handles and drawer pulls. After all the doors, hardware and drawers had been removed, I emptied the drawers of their contents and took all of those pieces out onto the deck to lessen any mess in the kitchen and to give me more room to work on them. With a little sandpaper, I gently sanded the surface of one of the drawer fronts and found out that sanding was going to work really well! Yes!!!

Painting the doors & drawer fronts

So I sanded each door – there are 16 cabinet doors in our kitchen – and the front of each drawer – we have 5. When they were all sanded, I used a damp cloth to wipe them down to prepare them for paint. I thought it might be nice to leave the edge of the drawers and the trim around the doors the original wood color so I chose to just paint the center of each and also use the crackle technique so some of the original light oak color would show through the painted section.

If you’ve not used crackle medium before, it’s super easy. You’ll just want to follow the instructions and not rush your topcoat. Applying your topcoat too soon will just smear everything and make a mess; waiting too long will allow the crackle medium to dry and you won’t achieve the crackled look you are trying to achieve.

The Behr paint palette I’ve been using in the house has 4 coordinating colors – Chocolate Cupcake 710D-7d, Butternut Wood 710D-6a, Mississipi Mud 710D-5a, and Harvest Brown 710D-4p. The walls in the kitchen are
Mississippi Mud (doesn’t that sound pretty? It actually looks like the inside of an avocado once applied) so I chose the darkest – Chocolate Cupcake (although it looks like olive green with the lighting in my house) for the base of the cabinets and then the wall color for the doors and drawers.

Painting the base cabinets

After applying the crackle medium to the inset on each door and the front of each drawer, allowing it to dry a bit, then applying the paint, I left those pieces outside to dry on the deck while and began working inside on the base of the cabinets. As the doors and drawers, a quick sanding with 150 grit sandpaper and a wipe down with a damp cloth was all it took to prepare the surface for paint. I was so pleased that the sanding was fast and easy and that the paint went on so quickly and smoothly. I used a small angled brush and a painting pad to do all of the painting. You can see which of these items I prefer to use on my painting page. Although one coat of paint covered really well, I did apply a second coat for durability.

Sealing the doors & drawer fronts

Now that the bases were painted, I went back out on the deck to give more attention to the doors/drawers. Since I had left the edges of the doors & drawers unpainted, to protect those surfaces from fingerprints and kitchen grime, I applied a coat of varathane. The only drawback to working on the pieces outside was that it was really hot August day and some of the varathane bubbled as it dried. The good thing, though, is that it’s not noticeable with the crackle look.

Painting the hardware

The next step in the project was to paint the hardware. The original color of the knobs, drawer pulls and hinges was antique brass which would have looked just fine with the new colors but I thought bronze would look better. I used spray paint for this step and it worked beautifully!

Finishing the project

Once everything was nice and dry, it was time to install the hardware and hang the doors. To be honest, this step is the one that took the longest. Getting the hinges on nice and tight and then holding the doors while screwing them to the hinges was a bit tricky. This is a step that would be easier with two people – hubby was at work and being the impatient project person that I am – I struggled through it alone.

The cabinets have been painted now for over 8 years – easy for me to remember because I was Skyping with the family at the time. They were having a baby shower for my niece who was pregnant with her twins. The twins turned 8 in November! The cabinet paint has only needed a slight touch-up along the edge of the countertop and the hardware has needed zero touch-ups! Since I was skyping and painting, I neglected to take action shots of the project but I did get some before and after pics. (I cannot believe I was naive enough to actually stand in the kitchen sink while cleaning those blinds! )

Cabinets Before

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Cabinets After

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Another cabinet project

Repainting the cabinets

What?! Repainting them? That’s right! It’s been close to 9 years since I painted the cabinets and I’m ready for a change. The paint has held up so well! The area that needs a bit of touch up is along the edge of the counter and the backsplash. Everything else has no needed any touchups!

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