How to renovate our kitchen?

kateaw

Hi,

We are up to the kitchen reno planning and trying to decide what we can do ourselves vs what we hire someone to do for us.

We ideally want to change the countertop, refresh the cabinet colour, replace the handles, replace the rangehood, and replace the kitchen sink and tap. See the helpful chat gpt photo for inspo!

With the countertop, as we will be putting a different sized sink and tap in it we were thinking we need to get a new countertop made, ideally a wood look one. Is this something we can order with kaboodle? Otherwise we were going to keep the same sink, upgrade the tap and get someone to wrap the countertop with a wood look vinyl to save costs. Any pros/cons or thoughts with this?

With the cabinets, if we were to repaint them ourselves (think lexicon quarter on the top, maybe a sage green on the bottom, and then not sure on the full wall of cabinets), what would be the steps for this. Additionally, if we wanted to add some panelling detail like the inspo pic (but on the drawers as well as cabinets) what would the steps in this be. We were also going to use grout paint and repaint the grey grout to white. For reference, we were going to add these handles from Lane. 

Any thoughts, ideas, feedback, price indications if tradies are needed?

EricL

Hello @kateaw 

Thanks for sharing your question about your kitchen renovation plans. Let's start with the countertop, since your benchtop is not that large, I propose looking at the Specrite 2200 x 600 x 26mm Timber Multi Use Pine Panel. It can be painted, stained or sealed with whatever benchtop product you would want to put on it. It can be simply joined end to end with no fancy mitre joins or specialty benchtop cuts. You can use standard benchtop joiners to secure the pieces together and you can create end pieces such as waterfalls if you wish to add that to your kitchen design. The best part is that its very affordable and is at par with vinyl wrap cost if not cheaper. Plus, it is easy to repair and mend should the surface be damaged with burns or accidental scratches. 

As to the pros/cons of a vinyl top, the vinyl material can't be repaired when burnt or damaged whereas a timber benchtop can be sanded down and re-sealed.

The Kaboodle benchtop series is also an excellent choice, you can order from them as well and they have a quite a number of choices in regards to laminate timber finishes. I have to say that the position of your sink is something that I have rarely run into and if you feel that its current location is effective then I agree with keeping it there. In regards to painting the kitchen cabinets, if your doors are melamine/laminate wrapped then I suggest using the Dulux Renovation Range painting system. It's been specifically designed to go over laminate or melamine surfaces.  

Here is a handy step-by-step guide: How to Paint Laminate Kitchen Cabinetry

The general steps are to clean the surface of the kitchen doors and panels, sand it lightly then clean the surface of sanding dust before applying the primer and top coat. I am big fan of sage green for the cabinetry the darker the better. It would work very well with a timber benchtop colour. 

The grout paint should transform your grout lines effectively as long as they have not deteriorated, otherwise if they are breaking apart it would be best to remove the old grout and apply a fresh batch. The handles you've chosen look great and should blend in with your kitchens new colour.

Here is a link for ideas and inspiration: Top 10 most popular kitchen projects

I also suggest having a look at these - Budget kitchen refurbishment using paint by @Shirld and Kitchen cabinet makeover using paint sprayer by @nicoleherrick.

If you have any other questions we can help with, please let us know.

Eric