What to do with ugly dated laminate built in wardrobes?

[Nahna]

Hi everyone!

We have large dated built in wardrobes in our bedrooms, sort of plasticy laminate type finish. What should be do? Replace the doors or get them painted? What is cheaper/ the best way to get them looking good?! Thanks v much for any advice.

We're getting rid of ours but if we had opted to keep them the doors, although white, are very dated so we would have replaced them. If your doors are a nice design it may be cheaper to get them sprayed.

Came on to say “burn them”, sorry, not helpful .

Are they standard sized doors? Is it possible to buy new ones that you like better?

Thank you! The doors are fine as very plain. Is spraying cheaper than replacing do you think? Thanks

We put up with our hideous monstrosities for about 14 years. After getting sick of the sight of them I did try and get local joiners/carpenters to come out and give us some ideas about what to do with them / replace or refurbish, but all three failed to turn up. I got so fed up that l got someone to rip them out..

Which then of course necessitated complete redecoration, new carpet, new wardrobes....

I'm probably not the best person to ask....

Haha! Yes they do need to go! But don't know the most cost effective thing to do. Don't care what the insides look like - they are well laid out, decent sized etc. Just need to change how they look to fit with the style we are going for. I suppose the options are to replace the doors or paint but don't know which is cheaper and also which will look best!

Might sound bonkers but how about amazing wallpaper? Can you wallpaper laminate doors? No idea.

My parents have these, installed circa 1989. All the rage then! They painted them in french chic paint. They look fine. I think they chose a dove grey type colour. Would a coat of paint change them enough so that they’d be to your liking?

I took them off and painted using a roller. This was to sell the house. Replaced with simple black pull handles and they looked fine. Very cheap solution.i used normal wood paint but have a look at frenchic paint. Much easier to work with (I've painted all sorts since!)

Are they flat or moulded?
If flat you could vinyl wrap them, otherwise just paint them.
Replacing doors costs a fortune if they’re not a standard size, I looked into replacing our hideous louvred pine wardrobe doors but they are huge so I’m planning on panelling them with board then painting.

We had some that sound similar in DD's bedroom. We painted them and they came up brilliantly. We just used normal emulsion paint that matched the walls.

Thanks so much everyone, sounds like painting is the cheaper option then! And yes, I believe they were done in the 80s! I'm guessing there are companies that specialise in painting them?! I'm no good at painting!

I painted a huge run of them in one of the dc's rooms. Undercoat and specially paint, new handles, looks lush. Cost about £30

@Lindy2

We had some that sound similar in DD's bedroom. We painted them and they came up brilliantly. We just used normal emulsion paint that matched the walls.

Emulsion worked? Did you need to protect them afterwards?

It seemed to work fine with just a couple of coats of emulsion. Occassional it's had a little scrape - due to DD being heavy handed but I've just touched it up with the same paint and it has been ok.

We had awful doors on our built in wardrobes in two bedrooms in a house we sold last month; they looked really dated but the inside space was fine.

We replaced them with the “Audi/Sekken” sliding doors from the Pax range in IKEA; one panel was mirrored glass (in 4 sideways sections) and the other panel was a grey frosted glass. (For white frosted glass you could go for Audi/ You can order online. The doors can also be hinged if preferred.

They looked so fresh and modern! The sliding doors also meant there was a little more space instead of wardrobe doors being pulled outwards when you opened them.

We also installed some of the Pax wardrobe shelves. There are many combinations to choose from, just look at the IKEA UK website.

Thank you, loads of great ideas!

We bought glass mirror doors to replace dark laminate stuff in dd room. Makes her bedroom look larger and useful too. The whole room looks a lot lighter. She still needed the storage so decided to keep it.