Cabinet painting in Leavenworth

Cabinet refinishing is the highest-leverage thing you can do to a dated kitchen, and it is also the job most often done badly — because the failure does not show up for six months, by which time the crew is gone.

When refinishing is the right call

The test is the boxes, not the doors. If the cabinet boxes are solid, square, and laid out the way you want the kitchen to work, refinishing gets you most of the visual result of new cabinets for a fraction of the cost. Doors and drawer fronts can be replaced separately if the style is the problem.

When it is not the right call: particleboard boxes that have swollen at the sink, a layout you actively dislike, or doors that are delaminating. Paint does not fix structure, and paying to refinish cabinets you will replace in three years is the worst outcome available.

What separates a finish that lasts

Kitchen cabinets get touched, cleaned, splashed and knocked more than any other painted surface in the house. A wall finish on a cabinet door fails fast.

• Degreasing first, properly. Years of cooking film sits on the doors around the range. Nothing bonds to it. This step is invisible and skipping it guarantees failure.
• Deglossing or scuff-sanding every surface. Factory finishes are slick by design.
• A bonding primer matched to the substrate. Thermofoil, oak with open grain, and maple all behave differently.
• A cabinet-grade topcoat, sprayed. Brush marks on a cabinet door are permanent and you will see them every day.
• Real cure time before rehanging. Dry and cured are not the same. Stacking doors too early is what causes the print marks people find later.

Doors off, or doors on?

Doors and drawer fronts come off and get sprayed flat. Boxes and face frames get done in place. Anyone spraying doors on the hinges is saving themselves time and giving you sags on the vertical surfaces.

That also means your kitchen is without doors for several days. Worth planning around.

Oak grain, and the thing nobody mentions

A lot of the kitchens here are 1980s and 1990s golden oak. Oak has deep open grain, and paint does not fill it — the grain telegraphs through the finish. Some people like that. Many do not, and are surprised.

If you want a smooth modern slab look out of oak cabinets, that requires grain filling, which is real additional labor. Ask whether it is in the quote, because the difference between the two results is large and the difference in the written estimate is often one line.