How To Paint Your Kitchen Cabinets So It Looks Like You Totally Replaced Them — How To

Painting your kitchen cabinets is the single most transformative thing you can do to your kitchen without a gut renovation. And, if you do it yourself, it can also be one of the least expensive ways to overhaul the space — just the cost of materials and, of course, your time.

And time it will take. People on the internet like to say that painting your kitchen cabinets is a quick weekend project. Maybe if it's a holiday weekend — and you can take another day or two off work! In reality, it's a project that can take a solid five or six days, depending on the size of your kitchen. (You literally have to wait for paint to dry!)

It's not all that hard, though — as long as you're patient and thorough, the transformation will be amazing. We teamed up with professional painters Chris and Lexi Dowding, of Michigan-based SwatchOut, to paint a real kitchen and distill the steps for you to DIY it. Warning: It's going to look like a lot of steps. And it is! But we also wanted to break down as much possible here, so that you have no questions in real life.

Here's what you need to know in order to paint your old, wooden kitchen cabinets so that they look like brand new (white!) ones.

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