Dark stain, slab doors with routed grooves and printed wood-grain fronts all accept new colour once the grease and old gloss are gone. On a kitchen this age, cabinet painting is mostly careful prep, and that prep decides how long the finish lasts.
Meadowvale did not grow by accident. Markborough Properties announced it in April 1969, the first shovels went in the ground in December 1970, and the early streets east of Winston Churchill Boulevard filled up through the 1970s. Meadowvale West came next in the 1980s. Many of those houses still have their builder kitchens, and quite a few still have their first owners.
Most kitchens from the 1970s here have dark stained doors hung on face frames. Some are solid oak or ash, or plywood with a wood veneer. Others are particleboard covered in a printed paper or vinyl that imitates wood.
You can usually spot the style right away. Plain slab doors with a routed line or V-groove were common, and so were "colonial" doors with a raised profile. Hinges tend to be exposed or half-hidden, sometimes black hammered metal. Handles are small knobs or long wooden strips, and the upper cabinets usually stop under a boxed-in soffit.
Every one of those details shows up in the cabinet painting quote. Real wood gets shellac primer so the stain cannot seep through. A printed skin gets a bonding primer. Grooves and profiles take extra time to sand and to spray evenly.
Golden oak took over in the 1980s. Red oak doors with arched tops or square raised panels fill many kitchens in Meadowvale West, especially on the streets that went in around Lake Aquitaine after it was dug in 1976 and 1977.
The second 1980s favourite was almond or white melamine with an oak strip on the edge to grab. The melamine face is slick and needs a scuff and a bonding primer. The oak strip needs shellac. So one door can take two primers, and a good quote spells that out.
Grain filling is the big decision with golden oak, and our oak page walks through it.
Grease hides in an older kitchen. It collects on the frames over the stove, along door edges and around every knob, and primer will not bond to it.
We wipe every surface down with a solvent degreaser before sanding starts, because sandpaper just drives grease deeper. Then we scuff the old lacquer until it is dull, since a 1970s factory finish is hard and glassy.
That means day one runs a little longer on these kitchens. It is also the day that decides whether the cabinet painting lasts.
Two items move the cabinet painting price on older kitchens more than anything else. The first is hinges. Many exposed and half-hidden hinges from the 1970s are out of production, so we either clean and refit the originals or drill the doors for hidden soft-close hinges.
The second is the soffit over the upper cabinets. We can paint it the cabinet colour or leave it to match the walls. Either is fine, and we price it before you choose. Our hinge and hardware page sets out the choices.
In most houses they are. Boxes from the 1970s and 1980s are often built from heavier plywood or particleboard than a low-cost kitchen sold today. When they are level, dry and screwed tight to the wall, cabinet painting gives them many more years.
Water damage is the exception. Particleboard that has puffed up under a leaky sink never goes flat again. We replace that piece and paint it with everything else.
A kitchen this age has to be seen. The door style, the hinges, the grease and the state of the boxes all shape the cabinet painting scope, so we check each one and write the price down. Phone +1 (289) 206-9922, book the visit online, or see the full list of services on our home page.
Backsplit bathrooms, laundry rooms, mudroom lockers and rec room bars get the coatings we trust in kitchens.
We take your doors and drawer fronts down, clean off the grease, sand them, prime them for their material and spray a hard enamel before hanging them again. Kitchen cabinet painting recolours the entire room while your counters, tile and sink stay untouched.
See Kitchen Cabinets
Oak brings two problems to the job that maple and MDF do not. Tannin in the wood stains through water-based primer, and deep grain lines show through cabinet painting unless they are filled flat first.
See Oak Cabinets
Some cabinets have wood that deserves to be seen. Refinishing takes the worn finish off, evens out the colour with new stain and seals it with a sprayed clear coat, so the grain stays in view instead of disappearing under paint.
See Refinishing
Spraying puts the coating on as a fine mist that levels itself before it dries, so there are no brush lines left behind. With a sprayer, cabinet painting comes out looking like it left a factory, not a hobby bench.
See Spray Painting
Melamine, laminate and thermofoil are slick by design, so cabinet painting on them depends on a bonding primer built to grip plastic surfaces. Sound doors finish beautifully, while vinyl already curling away from its board is past saving.
See Thermofoil and Melamine
With refacing, fresh doors and drawer fronts are hung on your current cabinet boxes and the frames are finished to suit. If just one door is ruined, we swap that one out and spray it with the others during cabinet painting so nobody can tell.
See Refacing and New Doors
Soft white or greige on top with sage, navy or charcoal below is the combination we are asked about most, and the island usually gets the darker shade. Painting an island by itself also counts as a full cabinet painting job.
See Two-Tone and Islands
A single vanity needs a day or two of our time, which makes it the least disruptive cabinet painting job we offer. Its doors travel to our booth, we spray the base where it sits, and the bathroom is ready again soon after.
See Bathroom Vanities
Most condo kitchens hold between ten and twenty doors, which means the spraying is quick once building approvals are in place. Cabinet painting in a condo townhouse or apartment runs smoothly only when parking, work hours and smell are planned ahead.
See Condo Kitchens
Laundry uppers, pantry cupboards, bench-and-locker units by the garage door, bookcases and fireplace built-ins all go through the primer and sprayed enamel your kitchen gets. Because nearly all of them are attached to the house, cabinet painting for these rooms happens on site behind plastic.
See Pantries and Built-Ins
Leftover knob holes get plugged and filled flush, and every new pull is bored through a jig so the whole row sits straight. Tired hinges get replaced during the same window, since cabinet painting already has the doors off.
See Hardware and Hinges
Meadowvale kitchens we quote mostly end up in one of six shades: sage, greige, cream, warm white, charcoal or navy. A little paper chip under store lights cannot show how any of them behaves in your room, so one of your own doors gets sprayed in the shade you like and propped up in the kitchen before any cabinet painting goes on the calendar.
See Colour ConsultationWe drop by, count doors and drawers, check the wood or board underneath and spell out the work in a written quote. No charge for any of it.
Jot down anything you know about the cupboards, and we will call to choose a day. A name and a number are all it takes. Want to talk right now? Call +1 (289) 206-9922.
