A Cheerful Kitchen Makeover For 935

With no budget for a complete redo, the interior designer decided to use simple, low-cost touches to give the room a new look and highlight original details, such as hardwood floors and the scalloped wood valance above the sink window. “I felt like I needed to maintain the integrity of the house,” she says. Keep reading to see how she did just that—for less. Shown: While all the cabinets and appliances are the same, new paint, fabric panels, and nickel-finished hardware give the room a colorful new look.

Before the Transformation

Most of the three-month-long, weekends-only project, though, was spent scraping up layers of vinyl and tar paper to refinish the hardwood floors underneath. Shown: Years of dirt and grime stood out in the dated, all-white kitchen.

Butcher-Block for a Baker

A new butcher-block-top island completed the revamp. “I bake a lot, so I really enjoy being in such a bright, happy space,” Michelle says. Paint, wall color: Gentle Tide, Glidden Paint, cabinet and wall trim: Powdered Snow, Behr Island: Stenstorp kitchen island, IKEA

Dull, Drab Kitchen

Michelle also sanded the scratched white laminate counters and brushed on oil-based primer and black oil paint, then used bright blue paint on the walls to add interest to an all-white kitchen.

The Project Tally

• Removed cabinet doors: $0 • Repainted the cabinet boxes a crisp white that pops against now sky-blue walls and black-painted laminate counters $125 • Added decorative adhesive-backed paper to the backs of the upper cabinets: $50 • Sewed fabric panels for the lower cabinets: $50 • Put new satin-nickel pulls on the cabinet drawers: $25 • Installed a new nickel-finished faucet: $75 • Removed the vinyl floor; rented a wallpaper steamer to take up the tar paper underneath: $35 • Sanded and polyurethaned the original hardwood floor: $450 • Butcher-block-top island and cart for extra prep and storage space New window lifts, heat register, base molding: $50 Total: $935 Shown: Removing the plain slab doors from all the cabinets allowed upper boxes to serve as open shelving for dishes.