The orange gel stripper is nice to work with, the fumes aren't bad, it cleans up pretty easily, and it does a nice job of breaking down the paint. The black came off very easily, then I reapplied the stripper to get at the white primer, which was a lot stickier.
An essential tool for removing paint is a nice sharp razor blade, and some coarse steel wool to get the stubborn stuff. To get the last remnants of paint out of some crevices, I resorted to scraping with some old dental tools I picked up a long time ago.
So last weekend after my earlier post, I got as far as stripping the black paint off of these upper cabinets, and the cabinet doors.
Once I had the wood bare, I brushed on a couple of coats of Amber Shellac. This stuff gives the wood a nice orange-golden finish, and it dries super fast. Five minutes of waiting and the shellac is ready. I like to hit the hardened shellac with some fine steel wool and then I'm considering it done. So here's where I left off at the end of the three-day weekend:
This looks so much better! The shelves also got some new vinyl shelf liner. I laid that down over top of the adhesive shelf liner that I gave up trying to remove. That stuff really sticks!
Yesterday and this morning I continued working on this area of the kitchen, stripping and refinishing the lower cabinets. I'm now about one-third of the way done with this job.
I cleaned, primed, and sprayed the handles with copper paint, then hit each with a couple coats of clear paint. I'm hoping that clear will keep the copper color from chipping off the handles. I'm figuring it's going to take about three more weekends of work and some evenings to get the rest of the cabinets done.
wow!! this is inspiring!!!
ReplyDeleteSlow clap, Uncle Atom, slow clap. Now you have the beauty of that finished section to keep you motivated to do more. Well done!
ReplyDeleteWow, indeed! That's very impressive. Does the Citristrip take off old shellac, too? My shellacked cabinet doors are alligatoring and need to be redone.
ReplyDeleteI believe it will strip old shellac - I've seen it come up of if these doors in areas where I previously had tried to sand down the old finish before I primered. You have to be patient and let the stripper break down the finish before scraping with a razor blade.
DeleteI agree with Bandita: You have inspired me! The kitchen is going to be beautiful.
ReplyDeleteCan't argue with the results, these look great. Personally I would have bypassed the stripper and broke out the trusty sander to take this all down, but to each his own and it's hard to criticize the end product...I just hate chemical stripperes if I can avoid them...
ReplyDeleteThis latex gloss paint would clog up sandpaper pretty fast. I'll sand when necessary but doing it by hand is tiring and power sanders can quickly take off too much wood. To each his own I guess.
DeleteYour so right, they look so nice back to the natural wood.
ReplyDeleteWoW!! Great job! Your cabinets look wonderful!
ReplyDeleteRobin from AR
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ReplyDeleteThanks for the encouragement everyone - still a long way to go, but so far, so good.
ReplyDeleteYOWZA!
ReplyDeleteYOWZA! They look great!
ReplyDeleteWow, it is like a night and day transformation! The golden tones in the shellac are beautiful. They really bring out the grain in the wood. I especially like the result on the scalloped part. It looks like a whole new "old" kitchen!
ReplyDeleteLooking fantastic! You're doing an outstanding job.
ReplyDeleteLooks fabulous! I admire your dedication to doing such a detailed job.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your choice of using a stripper instead of sanding. Usually I would just sand too, but when there is paint involved it can be a game changer. I just refinished 5 blonde doors in Mom's condo that had been painted and used a stripper on them too, if you don't strip first the paint almost turns into pebbles when you try to sand and rips the sandpaper the shreds - NOT GOOD!
ReplyDeleteYour kitchen looks AMAZING!!! I can't wait to see it all completed!
Wow, you dove right in! I'm impressed! I usually have to think about something for six months. They look gorgeous!
ReplyDeleteThat looks SOOO much better than the black.
ReplyDeleteIt looks FANTASTIC! The Shellac really does the trick! Hang in there and keep up the good work! (I've been improvingmy kitchen too, you'll get to read all abotu it next week!) I cant get over how great yoru kitchen looks!
ReplyDeleteThis kitchen has a long way to go, but I appreciate all you cheerleaders!
ReplyDeleteWow! It looks AMAZING! I'm super impressed.
ReplyDeleteThanks Betty
DeleteAnother "WOW!" Who knew there were gorgeous cabinets under that hideous black paint? And those handles are to die for!
ReplyDeleteYes, those handles are great, I really like the copper handles and hinges
DeleteAnother "WOW!" Who knew there were gorgeous cabinets under that hideous black paint? And those handles are to die for!
ReplyDeleteBeautiful cabinets, and the hardware is so awesome. All your hard work really paid off.
ReplyDeleteThose cabinets with the little open shelves on the end bring back so many memories. When I was a kid, I would give my Aunt Helen dandilions I would pick from her yard, and she'd put them on that little shelf over her kitchen sink.
Great story, thanks
DeleteAbsolutely gorgeous, I love natural wood cabinets. We just bought a sprawling 1955 California-style ranch, was a foreclosure and has some unfortunate "updates" including badly painted kitchen and bath cabinets. Beautiful hand-built birch and pine cabinets are hiding underneath; I was inspired by your cabinet progress to do the same with mine. I'll be using Citristrip as well, thank you for your tips in this post - greatly appreciated and most helpful.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your nice comments Jess, and good luck with your cabinets. Let me know if you have questions - I'd love to hear about your progress.
ReplyDelete