Update my kitchen on a budget

[Celp28]

I moved house last August and money is a bit tight in terms of big purchases for the foreseeable. My kitchen is in good condition, the cupboards are solid and not falling apart and the tiles are all in good condition, worktop is good, no cracks. However, I really dislike the colours! The cupboards are a funny, dirty cream colour and the tiles are a pinky/orange with a red strip going through. I work in a school and have the summer holidays coming up and I’d like to do so diy around the house. Have any of you ever used cupboard paint and tile paint to freshen up your kitchen? And if I do can I can colour completely, for instance go to a grey over the red tiles? Or will the red show through? I need to sell the idea to my husband as he is notoriously lazy and therefore critical of any diy as he’s afraid I’ll rope him in to helping 😂 I’m pretty sure I’d manage to paint the tiles and cupboards myself but I don’t want it to look rubbish! I doubt I’ll be able to afford a new kitchen for about 3 years so I’m hoping this would be a quick fix until then.

That's fantastic lifechangesforever I wish more people would consider doing this, instead of ripping out perfectly reasonable kitchens that just need a facelift.

• It's such a waste.

Can't comment on the tile painting, but I did walls and cupboards (about 20 fronts) and it got us another 10 years of use end enjoyment, before we could afford to replace!
What I would say is plan it with care. For a good result, take the doors off. You might need a special primer (paint formulation may well have changed now!). Using a small foam roller gives a good finish. Plan where you will prop the doors up while they are drying. I think I ended up painting each door 4 times: primer, paint, paint, paint details and handles. And a day drying between each. Again handles work better if you can take them off. I was also overpainting some really dark wood, and jade walls which also took two coats. I did it in a weeks leave, alone at home. I was so pleased with the result but won't post pictures as it does look terribly dated again since to was in 2002! In a nutshell: jade walls to buttermilk, and white melamine with 'Teak' handles and trimmings to a light sunny yellow. In a dark north-facing kitchen it was like night to day!

I don't like vinyl wrap, it peels.

But you can buy new doors for kitchen units at very modest prices.

Most common are pressed MDF with a paint or vinyl finish, but you can also get wood or (for maximum durability) with a hard laminate surface (these will be flat "slab" doors because they are cut from large sheets and then drilled and edged). You can also get matching laminate shelves and plinths made. I've had things made in Egger board, there is a wide range.

Unless you happen to live close to one of the large suppliers, it will be mail-order so minimise carriage costs by ordering all you need in one go. Look at the hinge positions carefully, they are likely to be standard. Buy a sample door first before making up your mind. They should be much cheaper than High Street showrooms.

I've had oddments from companies like these

www.ebay.co.uk/sch/Kitchen-Units-Sets/57231/m.html?_ssn=tradekitchenseu

www.ebay.co.uk/sch/benjamin-james-kitchens-bedrooms/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from=

@lifechangesforever how did you change the lino? Does it just run under the plinths but not actually under the units? Looking at doing similar!

Lifechangesforever, love your kitchen. What colour did you use on the cupboards? We have recently moved and I hate the dark wood kitchen doors

Does the cupboard paint not chip on melamine doors? I've got an Ikea kitchen (old style) and the white doors have yellowed. I'd love to paint them and get a few more years out of it.

@tentative3 I paid for someone to do it so I don't actually know 😂 what I will say though is that we have a really old house so it's a solid concrete floor under there - not sure it has plinths?

There's panels that run under the cupboards so they took them all off and ran the lino (although I actually don't think it's Lino actually, it's vinyl but really thick) under the panels and then put them back on.

That was probably the biggest outlay of the kitchen - it was about £400 but the room is 5x5 and a lot of vinyl isn't on the roll that large.

Thanks @Vitalogy we're a year in with it now and it still looks brand new too!

Yeah, and there's nowt wrong with Wilko paint either. That's where I get most of my paint from as well.

I have just googled tile stickers, they look like an option so thank you for that. Another poster suggested tiling over the existing tiles, would that work do you think? Might be an option as dbil has a tile cutter. All great suggestions, thank you all for your suggestions.

Lifechangesforever I love the transformation! I’d ideally like those rectangular tiles, they look fab and I love the colour of your units! That was from Wilko?

I think you could work with your existing kitchen without too much work.

Take tiles off and replace with a kitchen splash back. Ikea are good for this. Then buy or make a Roman blind for the window that ties in with the new splash back. Paint walls to compliment new colour scheme.

This would pull the kitchen together really cheaply.

Good luck and let us see what you do.

You can buy a whole kitchen on eBay very cheaply - all appliances included. A lot of people move into houses that have contemporary kitchens, in really good condition, but that are not quite to their taste and rip them out. Perhaps rather than spending £50 on paint & equipment, you could spend £100-150 on a whole kitchen

Alternatively, you could look into replacing the doors if the carcasses are in good condition, but this will be much more expensive and the lower end ones are really bad quality and will start peeling apart within months. What's your budget?

yes, provided you have a van and a couple of burly women to do the heavy lifting.

I needed a single matching unit in a discontinued range, bought it on ebay, when I got there, the vendor gave me an entire kitchenful of units he was replacing, and offered the appliances, but I didn't want them.

I paid more for the van and the helper than for the kitchen

Can I second wilko cupboard paint...I bought one tin at £14 and it did all my cupboards. I wasn't particularly careful, didn't sand or smooth before (one I forgot to even clean) and they all look amazing. Credit entirely to the paint, not me.

@Celp28 yep the tile and cupboard paint were both from wilko, we were lucky in that the original tiles were the rectangular shape we would have chosen ourselves - just completely the wrong colour for us.

We took all doors off and DH cleaned them with sugar soap and did a very, very light sanding. We also started the first ones with a primer first but actually - they scratched easily and when we just used the paint on it's own, they were much more resistant to scratching the paint so I wouldn't prime.

It was hard going for a good few weeks (because we were doing it around full time jobs) but so worth it.

For those asking..

Tile paint:
www.wilko.com/en-uk/wilko-one-coat-tile-paint-white-750ml/p/0341996

Cupboard paint:
www.wilko.com/en-uk/wilko-quick-dry-satin-furniture-cupboard-paint-mineral-stone-750ml/p/0341912

@mydogisthebest we used the 'Mineral Stone' colour - there's also a 'slate grey' but that one is a little dark.

I'm not sure how it would be on melamine but it does say it's suitable for that too!

You can buy a whole kitchen on eBay very cheaply I was just going to post this too. I've bought a pre owned one before from Ebay, used it for a couple of years, the place had virtually no units in, so I was really pleased to have some storage again. When I'd finished with it I put it on Freecycle! Someone collected it for a garage workshop.