Mini Kitchen Remodel - HD&E - A Stroll Thru Life

Mini Kitchen Remodel – The most builder-basic thing about our home when we moved in was the kitchen. The cabinets were a very light almost blonde maple, with white walls, white appliances, counters, and sink. Something had to change, this was really bad.

The first thing I did the week after we moved in was to paint the walls chocolate brown. (Sorry, I don’t have a before picture.) At least you could see the cabinets afterward, they didn’t fade into the walls.

I talked to a cabinet refinisher and he told me about “Dark Paste Wax”. There are several brands out there, the one I bought is called Brie and the shade is a dark walnut. After two coats of wax, the cabinets had a really nice warm brown tone. One that I could live with. Be sure to try it on the inside of a door first and make sure you go with the grain of the wood. This stuff works wonders to bring cabinets to life. I ordered some nice hardware off the internet at a very reasonable price and installed under-counter lighting. Now the cabinets were looking a whole lot better. The best feature of the kitchen was the pretty travertine tile floors. One of the worst-looking areas of the kitchen was the island. The white Formica counters, sink, and faucet looked really cheap. Then the very best part came. I received a remnant piece of granite as a gift, it would work perfectly for the island. You can see all the tools, this is immediately after they installed them. Most stone yards sell remnant pieces at 1/3 to 1/2 the sq. ft. price of a full sheet. These are small pieces only suitable for small jobs. With the gift of the beautiful granite, I needed a new sink and faucet. Again I found some great buys on the internet. This really changed the look of the island and the entire kitchen. I found some corbels to support the granite overhang, painted the island wall a soft camel color, and aged the detail on the corbels a little. Just this small piece of granite gives the kitchen a much more updated and custom look. I’ve been really happy with the results of such a small remodel. It doesn’t have to cost a fortune to make a big difference. Not counting the gift of the granite, the entire project came to a little under $400.00 for the sink, faucet, under-counter lights, corbels, and hardware. Huge improvement for a small investment. Welcome to Home & Decor Encore! My friends and I have been blogging for many years, so we have a ton of fabulous content from the past. Home & Decor Encore is where we dig into our archives and bring back some old posts that we can update and make fresh or ones you might have missed or are new to you! You can check out my full original post – Mini Kitchen Remodel. Doreen from Hymns and Verses keeps it all put together and us all organized. Be sure to check out what my friends are sharing this week.