This post is a LONG time coming…lol. I’m FINALLY sharing about our kitchen cabinet makeover! This was a project that took seriously so much work, but was 10000% worth it! Our kitchen used to feel so dark, old, and dingy – now it feels bright, clean, and inspiring! I’m still amazed that all I needed for this project was a sander, a couple cans of paint, new hardware, and paint brushes! So affordable & simple – just a ton of time & work! Keep in mind this is more of a 5-7 day project. If you want it to turn out well, it’s going to take some time!
Let’s get started with the process!
1. PURCHASE ITEMS NEEDED: We started by going and grabbing all of the paint supplies, which I’m going to link for you below! We bought everything from Lowe’s (except the hardware), including our paint. Here was our list: hand-held sander, sand paper, cabinet primer, cabinet paint, 4inch. cabinet paint roller, paint plastic, trim paint brush.
2. TAKE CABINETS OFF & REMOVE HARDWARE: This actually took quite a bit longer than I thought! We had to use a drill and unscrew all of the cabinet doors off – gets kinda tricky on the op cabinets! You’ll also want to take all of the hardware off before you start sanding 🙂 Also – keep track of the hardware if you aren’t going to be updating it!
3. COVER COUNTERTOPS AND OTHER AREAS: This is where we took the painters plastic & covered all of our countertops! We also covered the floor below the cabinets, as well as the areas we were going to be laying the cabinet doors to dry.
4. START SANDING!: You’ve done all of the prep work – now it’s time to start sanding the cabinet doors! We just used a card table and sanded everything on our patio with our hand sander. To be honest…this was probably the toughest part! You really want to put pressure on the door & make sure you get that top coat off! I also used sand paper to get into the corners of the details that are cabinets have on the front!
*Don’t forget to do the framing of the cabinets that’s left in the kitchen! I almost forgot to do this part and I would’ve been so sad if the cabinet doors were finished & I realized we still had the edging around the actual cabinets!
5. START PRIMING: One of the BEST pieces of advice I could give you is to use bonding primer!!! This stuff is MAGIC! I would suggest 2 coats of primer on each side, depending on how dark your cabinets are. Each coat will probably need 1/2 a day to dry! (Keep in mind this is more like a 5-7 day project if want it done well!) You’ll want to lay the cabinets out to dry on the plastic that you laid out. We just designated a space in our basement to let them dry & it worked perfectly!
6. TIME TO PAINT: Once the primer is completely dry & you have a couple coats on each side, it’s time to actually paint your cabinets that color you chose! EEK! We only did 1 coat of this & it worked for us! Make sure to let everything dry really nicely – you definitely don’t want to rush the drying part.
7. TIME TO HANG THE CABINETS & HARDWARE!: Finallyyyy it’s time to hang up those cabinets! After getting your cabinets back up, either put your new hardware on or put your old hardware back on! We got new hardware & we loooove it. SO affordable & looks so clean and modern!
I hope this was super helpful! It was definitely a tough DIY, but soooo worth it! I LOVE our kitchen now! If you want to follow me over on Instagram you can see all the details & I share our kitchen quite often 🙂 see you there!
