Kitchen Mini Makeover

Faced with the fact that we needed to do

something to/with our kitchen cabinets that were

peeling and had hinges that were breaking

(after eight years ago having new of both),

we chose the cheapest option which was just

 to re-hab the cabinets we already had.

A couple of years ago, I had started following

decorator Rachel Halvorsen's blog "Nestegg"

after seeing her on the cover and inside of

the magazine Garden and Gun. On her blog she had
 recommended a Sherwin Williams paint color
 called "Urbane Bronze" as one of her favorites
 for cabinets and doors.

Click here to see kitchen cabinets she had painted in Urbane Bronze.

Click here to see a great blog post she did called "Dark Doors".
  She shows photos of dark doors from other sources and explains the
 "whys" and "hows" of using dark doors in your home.
 At the end of the post she shows her own projects
using Urbane Bronze and  SW Tricorn Black.

I'm pretty much a "color chicken" and am happy to
rely on decorators' favorite color choices that I see in
magazines and on the internet.  I bought a sample of
the "Urbane Bronze" to test on different spots on the
 kitchen cabinets (since light in one area may affect color),
decided it was as good as any I might fret over, and
called our "go-to-guy-who-can-do-most-anything"

to come over and paint the cabinets and replace the hinges.

As a point of reference, here is what the kitchen
looked like when we bought the house:

When we moved in eight years ago,

we had the walls and tile backsplash painted green,

(Georgian Green HC - 115 Benjamin Moore)

painted cabinets the darkest green available (they looked

almost black), replaced hinges with invisible ones,

replaced appliances, replaced cabinet pulls, replaced

gray formica with a granite-looking formica, took

up fake wood floor and had tile put down.

My mother hates that cabinet color and says that it is "depressing".  I still like the color but

as long as we are having the cabinets re-done, might as well try another color for fun.

Here is the same view with the new "Urbane Bronze"...

...and here is how we got there:

Our guy removed the cabinet doors to take them

to his workshop to sand and paint them and

get them ready for the new hinges.

He painted the bases and the drawers in place.

He told me not to be shocked when I saw the

primer color but it was hard not to be...so pink!

The plain expanse of plywood on the traffic side of the

peninsula has always bothered me.  Our Guy and I

worked out a design he could easily apply with pine

molding to add interest to that area.

The ends of the peninsula have angles that took a little more

consideration.  For the floating end, we decided to have one

larger molding box wrap around the angle instead of trying

to squeeze in two boxes or have none.

(oopps! that plug has GOT to be painted)

For the attached end, we decided to ignore the extra inches

that go back into a funky corner and just make that

molding box the same size as the main ones.

Here you can see how much better the real color

looks than the primer color.

There was very little "down time" for the kitchen since we

went with for cosmetic changes only.  We all just kind of

worked around each other while the changes were being made.

The paint is still wet in this photo so the cabinets look very shiny.  The cabinets were painted with oil-based

semi-gloss so they dried to a lesser shine but it  seems glossy enough for us. 

I still like the basket pulls so we just re-used them.

They actually show up better now on the lighter color.

Here are some other views of the newly painted cabinets:

Each of the stools now have their own parking place

marked by the new molding. 

When we painted the cabinets eight years ago, the stools

also got a coat of the same color.  Soon they will be getting

repainted again but for now they show us the difference

between the old and new paint colors.

I hope my mama likes the new cabinet color better.

I hope YOU like my new cabinet color too!