Kitchen Cupboards...Is It Time For A Makeover?

There's no doubt that kitchen cupboards or cabinets are an important part of your kitchen design.  It can also be expensive if you wish to dump your old cupboards in exchange of new ones.  Here are some thoughts on kitchen cupboards...

A kitchen can be one of the most expensive rooms to remodel in your home. There are the appliances, of course, and depending on which ones you choose, this can be a huge part of the expense of remodeling.  But that’s an obvious budget hit we’re all prepared for. What many people overlook is the cost involved in replacement of the kitchen cupboards and cabinets.

When I remodeled my kitchen recently, after I found out how expensive it would be to replace the kitchen cupboards, I considered simply refinishing the ones I already have. I couldn’t believe that wood and finish could cost so much money when I could just take the existing cupboards, strip them, sand them and refinish them for a fraction of the cost. I changed my mind about doing that after watching a television show about house flipping and seeing all the work that goes into refinishing the cabinets that were already in place. It was a lot more work than I thought.

I decided to just buy new fixtures, figuring that the time I would save by not refinishing the existing kitchen cupboards would be worth the extra expense. What I hadn’t planned on, though, was that my husband and I would have such different taste in kitchen cabinetry.

I wanted kitchen cupboards that were simple and functional and I thought that getting a couple of cabinets with glass doors on the front would add a pretty touch.

My husband had other ideas. He wanted stylish, fancy, masculine-looking cabinets, with all the special features like a special custom drawer for pots and pans and a butcher block cutting board that slides out from a secret compartment built into the kitchen cupboards. And he would not even entertain my idea of glass front cabinet doors because our kitchen cupboards are always such a mess. What’s the point of having see-through cabinets to display our messiness to the world? He had a good point. It’s hard enough cleaning the visible areas of our home when we have people over without worrying about making sure our kitchen cupboards are in order.

Eventually we compromised and purchased cabinets for our kitchen that we both liked. We decided against the glass front doors, and did not get any custom made features like the sliding butcher block cutting board. And the new kitchen cupboards still ended up costing us more than the replacement price of all the appliances.

Give You Kitchen Cupboards a Makeover

Giving your existing cabinets a "facelift" will save you money.  Here are some helpful tips:

1. Clean your cupboards.  Especially if there's good wood underneath...you'll find that simply cleaning your cabinets will make them look a lot more presentable.
2. Change the hardware.  Go to any home improvement store and pick out some new handles for a cheap and quick improvement.
3. Paint.  Give your cupboards a new color and finish.  This will breathe new life into old looking cabinets.
4. Simply change the doors.  Why install a brand new cabinet when refacing yout older cupboards does the trick

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