If your cabinets are looking dingy or outdated, it’s time to give them a quick refresh. While full replacement and refacing are great ways to give your kitchen cabinets a second life, an easier and lower-cost method is to stain the cabinets.
Staining brings the original beauty back to the wood. Using a combination polyurethane top coating and stain saves time and eliminates the need to completely sand off the existing coating. Staining cabinets is even easier than painting cabinets or repainting cabinets, and most kitchens can be completed in just a couple of days.
Before You Begin
For previously stained cabinets that will be stained in the same color range or darker, it is not necessary to sand off all of the stain and surface coating. The stain product will seamlessly blend with your current stain. Just make sure to sufficiently sand down the top coating to produce a rough finish. This will help the stain product stick to the surface better.
For painted cabinets, all of the paint must be removed down to bare wood. Use liquid paint stripper, along with a scraper, steel brush, and sandpaper, to remove the paint. All paint must be removed. Any remaining paint will shed the stain product and will show through.
Safety Considerations
Work in a well-ventilated area and use breathing protection. Move the removed cabinet doors and drawers to a protected outdoor area, if possible. Indoors, open windows and use fans to expel air. Do not blow air into the room, as this can cause dust to settle on the finished surfaces.
Source: The Spruce
