Cabinets, To Paint or Not To Paint!? — Worker Bee Restoration and Design

As mentioned in last week’s blog, (check it out if you have not had the chance yet :)), this week we will discuss the thought process and execution of painting my kitchen cabinets. The process all started with a picture on Pinterest that showed a kitchen with these beautiful blue cabinets. I loved them and needed to have them, so my mission began.

I researched for months on the best ways to paint cabinets so they would look somewhat professional. I had very unsuccessfully painted old dressers in the past in such a way that all you would do is look at them and the paint would chip off. Turns out the sanding I did was not enough and latex paint just would not stick. Not wanting that to happen in the kitchen, I knew I would need to find a latex alternative or strip and sand the cabinets until my arms fell off. Latex alternative was the winner! I knew people who had raved about chalk paint but at the time I was not happy with the top coat choices of chalk paint and feared the durability of it. Enter milk paint. I had never even heard of such a thing. I stumbled upon the name first then started the search of what it was and what people’s experiences with it on cabinets were. So many blog posts came up and from there I was sold. I found a brand that was recommended, General Finishes, and started looking into the different colors and finishes. Luck would have it, they had the blue I had been searching for.

My first attempt would be on a buffet I found on Craigslist. I originally had a small microwave stand on a main wall in the kitchen and it just didn’t work. It looked awkward and was just a bad use of space. I wanted a more prominent, permanent piece that would offer storage and I wanted it to be a coffee station as well. With the blue paint in hand and the doors and draws removed off I went. The first step of milk paint is to use Krud Kutter Deglosser. I was skeptical but boy does this stuff pull all kinds of grossness off of your cabinets. If you think they are clean use Krud Kutter, I bet you will be surprised. With that one step done it was time to paint! I used a good quality paint brush for the hard to reach areas and a small foam roller that says for cabinets on the package. The finish with this is flawless!

Holy blue!!!! So I had read that the blue I wanted was achieved by using General Finishes Corinth Blue and black glaze. Well I started the blue and was shocked at how bright it was! I never thought I would achieve the look just by adding a black glaze over it but sure enough after 2 coats of the shocking blue the paint was complete and the glaze was added. It magically transformed to exactly what I wanted. The original plan was to do the entire kitchen with the blue. After placing the buffet in the kitchen, however we did realize the color would be overwhelming if the entire kitchen was that color. After all it is not the biggest kitchen in the world. So with that in mind I now had to pick a color for the cabinets.

Before and after applying glaze.

I decided I liked the antique look that the glaze gave the buffet and to keep it simple, and keep the buffet the highlight of the kitchen, decided to go with white paint with a brown glaze. As a test to see if we would like the cabinets we started with a small section that only contained two uppers and 4 doors. I removed all the doors and hardware. For the hinges, since they fit so perfect, I simply cleaned them up, spray-painted them with a brushed nickel spray paint and a few coats of clear finish. The cabinets took 3 coats of white to really cover the old dark stain. From there it is one coat of top coat, a wipe down with the brown glaze using a lint free t-shirt material cloth and 2 more coats of top coat to seal it all in (same steps went for the buffet). There is definitely some trial and error with the glaze portion. I recommend having a test piece instead of just going at the cabinets like I did. There are some spots I don’t love but I convince myself that I am the only one to notice them.

Painting definitely took longer than expected. I continued on the path of doing sections of cabinets at a time breaking it down into 4 sections and each section took about 3 days to complete with dry time. If I did it over I would do it all at once. It is easily achievable, depending on kitchen size, to complete in a week versus taking a month.

The finished product! After the buffet was done we (aka my dad) routered out the top to inlay tile for the coffee bar and installed open shelving above. For the other half of the kitchen we installed an inexpensive IKEA laminate counter and new back splash (yay for first time tiling success!) and matching handles and draw pulls throughout. We kept the tile neutral but added a matching strip of accent tile to tie into the buffet top.

Thanks for reading!