Keeping the wood on show is the point. Stripping or sanding clears the old coating away, fresh stain evens out whatever has faded, and a hard sprayed clear coat locks the grain back in.
This treatment is worth it on white oak, cherry and walnut, provided the wood itself is in good order. Kitchens from the 2000s in Angus Glen, Cachet and early Cornell often hold cherry or dark maple that has gone amber near the window and worn thin around the sink, and cabinet painting is not always the right answer for them.
Refinishing Is Not Cabinet Painting And The Two Answer Different Problems
Cabinet painting puts an opaque colour over the wood, so species and grain stop mattering. Refinishing keeps both on show, which means the wood has to deserve it. Solid walnut, cherry and quarter-sawn white oak usually do, and they are the kitchens we steer away from cabinet painting. Veneer that has bubbled, sun-bleached panels and doors with deep water marks usually do not, and those kitchens are better served by cabinet painting.
We say which one a kitchen belongs in at the visit, even when refinishing turns out to be the smaller job. A cabinet painting company that recommends colour in every house it enters is selling rather than advising.
Stripping Or Sanding Comes Down To The Old Finish
A thick catalysed lacquer or conversion varnish is usually taken back chemically, because sanding through a hard factory film risks cutting into veneer that may be less than a millimetre thick. A thinner oil or wiping varnish on a solid door can be sanded back instead, working up the grits and finishing by hand along the grain.
Either way the goal is bare, even wood with no old coating left in the pores or the profile corners. Anything left behind shows up as a patch once new stain hits it. Drawer fronts and doors head to the shop for stripping, as they do for cabinet spray painting, and the face frames are worked on site.
Stain Goes On To Correct Colour, Not To Hide Damage
Once the wood is bare, stain can hold the original tone, warm it, darken it or shift it cooler. Cherry that has gone orange over twenty years can be pulled back toward a neutral brown, and a faded oak can be brought closer to the walnut tone that is fashionable now. Species that blotch, maple and birch among them, need a conditioner first, since stain forgives far less than cabinet painting does.
Stain will not hide a gouge, a burn mark or a water stain that has gone into the fibre. Those get repaired where repair is possible and disclosed where it is not. A door past repair is replaced in the same species, then stained until it matches its neighbours.
Clear Coat Gets The Same Care That Colour Gets
Two or three thin clear coats follow the stain, sanded lightly between, in the waterborne systems our cabinet painting work also uses. A clear film shows every defect that colour would bury, so the sanding ahead of it has to be right. Sheen gets picked at sample stage exactly as it does for cabinet painting, because satin, matte and semi-gloss each change how much grain the eye picks up.
Refinishing costs broadly what cabinet painting costs on the same kitchen, sometimes a bit more where stripping runs heavy. Whole-kitchen work in Ontario usually falls between $2,500 and $5,500, and your figure is whatever the free visit produces in writing. Mixing the two is common, and a refinished wood island beside painted perimeter cabinets is covered on the two-tone kitchens and island painting page.
Refacing Is For When Most Doors Are Past Saving
Once the majority of doors are beyond what filler and cabinet painting can fix, new fronts across the whole kitchen become the sensible step. Refacing keeps the boxes, the layout, the counter and the plumbing, and changes every visible surface: doors, drawer fronts, end panels and the face frames.
Refacing is also the route for changing door style, where cabinet painting only changes colour. Cathedral arch oak becomes flat shaker, or a dated raised panel becomes a slab front, without touching the rest of the kitchen. New fronts are sprayed in the same booth as our regular cabinet painting work, so a refaced kitchen and a painted one come out with the same finish.
Ask Us If This Wood Is Worth Keeping
One photo of a door in daylight usually settles it before anyone visits. Book a visit or call +1 (289) 201-7026, and a sample panel can be stripped and stained so the outcome is visible rather than imagined. Refinishing, cabinet painting and the rest of our services across Markham and Unionville are set out on the Markham Cabinet Painting home page.
Cabinet Refinishing Questions
When is refinishing better than painting?
When the wood is solid and worth showing, such as walnut, cherry or quarter-sawn white oak. Bubbled veneer, sun-bleached panels and deep water marks usually suit painting better. We say which one fits your kitchen at the free visit.
Do you strip or sand the old finish?
A thick catalysed lacquer or conversion varnish is usually taken back chemically, because sanding could cut through thin veneer. A thinner oil or wiping varnish on solid wood can be sanded back, finishing by hand along the grain.
Can stain hide scratches and water marks?
No. Stain corrects colour and does not hide damage. Gouges, burns and stains that went into the fibre are repaired where possible and disclosed where not. A door past repair is replaced in the same species and stained to match.