Two-tone work puts one colour on the perimeter cabinets and another on the island or lower run, giving a plain kitchen depth and a focal point without buying a single new cabinet.
Almost every open-plan kitchen built in Holly, Ardagh, Painswick South and Innisfil's Alcona since 2000 has an island, and the island is what people see from the living room, so it is where cabinet painting should start. Navy, green or charcoal on the island beside a white or greige perimeter is the cabinet painting request we hear most in Barrie right now, and how the pair gets chosen is on the cabinet colour consultation page.
The pairing succeeds when both colours lean the same way, warm with warm or cool with cool. A warm white perimeter takes a navy with a touch of green or a deep forest green. A cool white takes a slate blue or a true charcoal. Greige uppers sit well over a wood-tone or black island. Mixing a warm white with a cold navy is the most common mistake, and it makes the white look yellow.
We paint a sample door in each colour and stand them together in the kitchen before any cabinet painting starts, because the light at the island is never the same as the light at the perimeter. A kitchen off Mapleview Drive with a south window and a kitchen in Letitia Heights with a north one will read the same two colours very differently.
An island alone is a genuine cabinet painting job and a frequent one. Many newer south-end kitchens already have white shaker perimeter cabinets in good shape, and only the island wants changing. Island cabinet painting usually takes two days: one to pull and tag the doors, degrease, sand, prime and spray the base in place, and one to rehang the doors once the booth has finished them.
Ontario market pricing places a two-tone island roughly at $800 to $2,000 on top of a kitchen, while an island done alone is priced by its doors and drawers, usually toward the bottom of the market's $130 to $250 per-door band. Your price is the written quote.
Navy, forest green and charcoal cover poorly over a white or grey primer. Two-tone cabinet painting in a deep colour uses a primer tinted toward the topcoat and usually a third sprayed coat, which is why the island line on a quote is slightly higher per door than the perimeter line. The extra coat is thin, sanded between passes like the others, and it is what keeps a dark island from showing light edges after a year of chair scuffs. The cabinet spray painting page explains the thin-coat method that makes this possible.
Not every island gets paint. When the island is decent maple, cherry or white oak, the better two-tone paints the perimeter and refinishes the island under a clear coat so the wood shows. Early-2000s kitchens in Painswick South and East Bayfield often have exactly that maple island. Stripping and clear-coating are covered on the cabinet refinishing page, and either way the island gets its own line on the quote.
Send a kitchen photo and name the colours you keep coming back to, and two painted sample doors come along to the free visit. Use the form or phone +1 (705) 230-7220. How island work sits alongside everything else we paint across Barrie, Innisfil and Oro-Medonte is on the Barrie Cabinet Painting home page.
An island in a deep colour against a light perimeter is the highest return of any cabinet painting job for the money, and it is often done in two days.
Prep, primer and a sprayed coating of the very same kind go onto whatever other cabinets a house holds.
Kitchen cabinet painting starts with the doors, the drawer fronts and the boxes already in the house, cuts the grease and old sheen off them, primes each for its material and sprays on a new colour that cures hard enough for everyday use.
See Kitchen Cabinets
Tannins in golden oak get sealed under shellac before anything else happens. Filler then closes the open pores until they disappear, and sprayed colour finishes doors that were solid all along. Oak cabinet painting suits them well.
See Oak Cabinets
Cabinet spray painting is sprayed cabinet painting: primer and topcoat go on as a fine mist in thin, even passes, so doors and boxes finish with a smooth, level film free of brush ridges, roller stipple and thick edges that chip.
See Spray Painting
Thermofoil, melamine and laminate doors take paint only over a bonding primer made to grip slick factory surfaces, followed by a sprayed topcoat, which lets doors that would otherwise shed ordinary paint within months hold a new finish instead.
See Thermofoil and Melamine
Cabinet refinishing leaves the wood on display: the worn finish gets stripped or sanded away, fresh stain goes on where the colour is shifting, and instead of paint the doors get sealed beneath a sprayed clear coat.
See Refinishing
Refacing means fresh doors and drawer fronts hung on boxes worth keeping, while a single damaged door simply gets swapped for a new one; old and new then pass through one booth together so nothing looks different.
See Refacing and New Doors
Cottage kitchen cabinet painting deals with knotty pine that bleeds through paint, small kitchens that need to stay usable, and buildings that are cold and closed for half the year, by using shellac primer and timing the work for the warm months.
See Cottage Kitchens
Hardware and hinge work fills old handle holes, drills fresh ones on a template once the finish has cured, and swaps tired self-closing hinges for soft-close ones, so new pulls and quiet doors arrive with the new colour.
See Hardware and Hinges
Bathroom vanity painting brings the kitchen routine of degreasing, priming and a sprayed topcoat to the small cabinet under the sink, over one or two days, paying extra attention to the doors that sit closest to the water.
See Bathroom Vanities
Pantry, laundry and built-in work covers cabinetry that cannot travel to a booth, from walk-in pantries and laundry or mudroom runs to fireplace wall units, mantels and bookcases, every piece sprayed in place inside a sealed enclosure.
See Pantries and Built-Ins
Small galleys, building rules, elevator bookings and parking are what condo kitchen cabinet painting has to manage, so doors go out for spraying and the unit stays livable while the boxes take a day or two.
See Condo Kitchens
A cabinet colour consultation fixes the colour and sheen ahead of cabinet painting by spraying one of your own doors in the real product and leaving it in the kitchen, so the decision gets made under the room's own light.
See Colour ConsultationWe visit, count the doors, work out the material and write the quote up, at no charge and with no obligation.
Tell us about the kitchen in whatever detail you have and a call follows to arrange the visit. The form goes through as soon as it has your name and a phone number on it. When a call is simpler, dial +1 (705) 230-7220.
