DIY Painted Bathroom Cabinets

I’m so excited to finally reveal our new and improved master bathroom! We spent most of last week on our hands and knees painting these cabinets. I’m not going to lie, it was a lot of work and we may have had a couple breakdowns in the midst of this project. In the end, I am so happy we did it and I am pleased with the outcome. I’m including some before and after photos below to show the dramatic difference we achieved with just a little bit of paint.

What did we use?

We used the Rust-Oleum Cabinet Transformations Kit and it was pretty straightforward and easy to use. When you purchase the kit at Home Depot, you need an employee in the store to tint the bond coat for you. We had our bond coat tinted to the Pure White color.

Depending on how many cabinets you have, you may need more than one kit. Luckily, we were able to finish our bathroom with everything in the one kit, but we were definitely running low on paint at the end! If I were painting a bigger area, I would probably go out and buy paint by gallon instead.

Overall, I would recommend this product if you have a smaller area to cover, but I wouldn’t recommend it if you are trying to paint a large kitchen. We needed about 5 coats of this paint to cover our cabinets thoroughly, so I don’t think the kit is a great solution for bigger projects. I would definitely invest in a high quality paint if you are trying to paint a larger area. I don’t think we would have needed as many coats if we had better paint to start with.

How much time did it take?

Painting the cabinets took us about 40 total man hours. We completed the project in about 5 days, and I thought we were moving pretty quickly. We only had 4 drawers and 7 cabinet doors, so we didn’t have too much ground to cover. You could definitely tackle this within a week if you have a similar size bathroom.

How much did it cost?

The cabinet transformation kit was only $80, but we did spend a little more money for brushes and other random supplies. Here are some of the other supplies we purchased:

• Painting Drop Cloth
• Brushes and Rollers
• Mineral Spirits (to clean the cabinets)
• Painter Pyramids
• Plastic Painting Trays

All in all, I don’t think we spent more than $150. Not a bad deal to get your bathroom cabinets painted!

Would we do it again?

Yes. We would absolutely paint our cabinets again. Sure, there were plenty of frustrations throughout the process, but I am happy with the end result. Overall, it really boils down to having a lot of patience and taking the time to do it right. Also, you can’t beat the cost savings by doing it yourself. If you hire someone to do this for you, it will cost thousands of dollars.

That all being said, we have officially decided to paint our kitchen cabinets white! I’m really excited because I’ve wanted a white kitchen since the day we moved in. We will be using a different process for the kitchen since we have a much larger area to cover. We are actually going to invest in a paint sprayer, and we will be spraying all of the doors and drawers instead of painting those by hand.

What’s Next for the Bathroom?

As you can see from the photos, we changed a couple other things in the bathroom like the trim around the mirror, the towel rack, cabinet hardware, soap dispensers, etc. We also ordered these light fixtures off of Amazon, so we will be installing those later this week.

Stay tuned for a follow-up blog post covering the entire bathroom renovation! I will be taking updated pictures once we get the light fixtures in. We also want to install new faucets for our sinks and bathtub. Another thought we had was to get frameless shower doors installed, but I think we will wait on that since it isn’t cheap.

Overall Tips & Tricks for Painting Cabinets

• Label all of your cabinet doors and drawers. Not all doors fit the same, so you need to make sure everything goes back into it’s original location.
• Clean your cabinets thoroughly before starting anything.
• Prep work! The more you prep, the better the outcome. Don’t skimp on taping, cleaning and prepping the cabinet surface.
• If you are going to paint your cabinets by hand, purchase the nicest brushes you can find. You will see less brush strokes if you invest in a good quality brush.
• Have plenty of rags on hand for wiping down the cabinets between steps.
• Be patient and know that it isn’t going to get done quickly.
• Champagne helps 🙂

Overall, I am happy with the end result, and I love how bright our bathroom is. I am still shocked at how much a few coats of paint can transform a room. I feel like we have a brand new bathroom!

Have y’all ever painted your own cabinets? If so, what did you think? Would you do it again or was it the worst experience of your life? I would love to hear your opinions and what method(s) you used!