Refinishing your kitchen cabinets is a great alternative to completely replacing them. It will save you a lot of money by choosing to refinish what you already have instead of buying all new. Chances are, if you’re reading this article, you’re exploring ways to refinish the cabinets in your Oakville kitchen to give them a fresh, new look. If you’re looking for ways to refinish your cabinets with a professional look, here’s what you need to know.
Although these terms are sometimes used interchangeably, they are not quite the same thing. With refacing, you keep your cabinet boxes but replace the doors and drawers. With refinishing, you keep your original cabinets and hardware but change the finish or colour. In this article, we will focus on refinishing.
Here are some of the steps taken by the pros:
Trying to finish the cabinets in place is one of the reasons the finished product will look less than professional. A company hired to refinish your cabinets will take apart your kitchen, take off all the hardware and remove the drawer handles. They will also take all the doors off of their hinges, and each door will be labelled in some way so that they know how to reassemble your kitchen in the right way when it’s time.
Some companies will then mask off the kitchen if doing the refinishing on-site. Trends Wood Finishing, however, will remove cabinet doors, drawers and components to be refinished in our facility and cause less inconvenience to your family. We do, however, on-site painting of cabinet edges and non-removable parts.
We’re getting close to adding the new finish, but we’re not there just yet. The next step is to prep the cupboards and drawer handles to be painted. Life is really hard on our kitchen – it’s the room our family likely uses the most so your cabinets are going to show wear and tear over time.
A professional refinisher will wipe down and scuff or sand each part that is going to be refinished. This step will help make sure the primer bonds to the cabinets and doesn’t flake off prematurely. If there are any scratches or light repairs that need to be done to the cabinets, this is the time to do them.
The next step is to prime the cabinets, getting them ready to refinish. Regardless of the colour (if you are using paint) you’ve chosen for your kitchen, all primers are white.
The doors, cabinets and frames of your kitchen cabinets will all get this primer coat. Additionally, any imperfections, scratches or dents will be really easy to see after priming, so there may be some additional repairs during this step before going on to painting. Depending on the company and your kitchen, they may sand everything down and apply a second layer of primer.
Now we get to the really good part: the colour or stain going on. As long as the primer coats went on well and there aren’t any other imperfections, the cabinets are ready to refinish. The best way to get a professional-looking finish is by spraying on the paint or stain and not using a roller or paintbrush.
After refinishing comes the re-assembly of doors, drawers and parts, plus the installation of new soft closing hinges and handles.
If you’re ready to give your Oakville kitchen the update you’ve always wanted, you can count on the professionals at Trends Wood Finishing today. Call us today to discuss your upcoming project.
*Oakville / Burlington Ontario
