How to Distress Your Kitchen Cabinets

The newest look in kitchen cabinets is the distressed look. You see it now in all kinds of houses. In particularly in more upscale expensive homes. Now you can get that look too. It is not a difficult look for a do it yourself type person. You can get the look from a professional company, but there is really no need. It is not a difficult look to achieve. It is the newest look in kitchens along with a beautiful marble or granite counter top. This is a Tuscan or french country look in a home. Since these looks are now all the rage, this is a great effect to do to cabinets anywhere in your home.

To begin distressing your kitchen cabinets you first need to take off the varnish or paint or stain that is now on your cabinets. To do this you simply need to sandpaper or use a chemical treatment to remove any old surface color. You can get both sandpaper or a chemical compound for paint or stain removal at any home improvement store. This is a labor intensive project but not something anyone can do by themselves.

Your next step is to decide what you want your cabinets to look like. If you simply want them to look worn you could hammer them up a bit, perhaps even take some knicks out of them in different places. Then if you want them restained you just go over them with that color stain and a varnish or polish of some sort to help keep them clean. Sometimes the stain comes with a polish already in it, so it is simply a one step project. The stain will stick to any dent or knick more than any other place. This will make it look darker in certain areas and this gives an old world look to your cabinets. If you wish to add molding on or around the cabinet doors, the stain will stick inside the lines of the molding. This adds to the distressed look of the cabinets.

Another great way to get a distressed look to your cabinets is to paint them over first. You can also bang them up a bit before you paint. Any knicks or faults in your wood will look nice with this treatment ,too. You may also want to add molding to them, if there isn’t any, because this process will look nicer if there is a bit of molding on the doors. You can choose any color paint you want. It is good to use a semi-gloss or gloss paint for your cabinets. This makes them easier to clean, once they are finished. Sometimes the cabinets look nice with a slightly darker color on them. Not too dark, more like a medium or light color. A nice look is to paint your cabinets a light color, like tan, off white, yellow, etc. After the paint is dry you then add a glaze over the paint color. Some glazes dry into the paint, others you need to add a coat of laquer over. Read the directions on the label of glaze you choose. A dark glaze works best, like chocolate, black, brown, etc. You can put the glaze on heavy or thinner, whatever is pleasing to your eye. A lighter glaze is nice, then you get the darker tones in the molding and the distressed parts of the cabinet. This is a very high end look nowadays, this is what you typically see in the higher end homes. You can buy cabinets that already look like this treatment, or have them done by a professional cabinet refinisher. But this look can be done a lot more inexpensively by you. All the materials can be bought at any home improvement store.

There are many great looks for distressed cabinets. You need to look in magazines and see what style and types you like. You may even go to kitchen show rooms or home improvement places to see what is out there. Then you can always take your kitchen cabinets and simply distress away. It is a bit of a process and takes some time, but with a bit of effort you can distress your kitchen cabinets yourself.