Fronts leave for a booth; boxes are coated where they stand, behind containment. What returns looks factory finished, wears a new colour, and costs a fraction of replacement. Kitchen cabinet painting is how a tired kitchen gets there.
Over half of Kingston's houses were built before 1981, and the kitchens in Bayridge, Henderson Place, Calvin Park and Amherstview still carry the oak, maple and melamine they were built with. Painting those cabinets is the most common job we do, and the oak cabinet painting page covers the biggest group of them.
Kitchen grease is the reason painted cabinets peel, so day one of any kitchen cabinet painting job goes to cleaning. Each door and front comes down, gets a numbered label and a photo of its spot, and gets a solvent wash that lifts the wax and cooking film that soap and water leave behind. The boxes get the same treatment in place.
Then everything is sanded to about 220 grit, dents and any old handle holes get filled, and gaps are caulked. The primer is chosen by material: shellac for oak and other tannin woods, a bonding primer for melamine, thermofoil and laminate, and a standard cabinet primer for maple, poplar and MDF. Wall paint and wall primer do not belong on any of it.
In the booth, the doors and fronts receive a few thin coats of waterborne alkyd enamel, or of 2K polyurethane, each one lightly sanded before the next. Thin coats level out, dry evenly and cure into a hard film. A brushed coat goes on thick, stays soft for weeks, and chips first at the corners and at the handles.
Boxes get sprayed in the kitchen inside sealed plastic, with the counters, floors and appliances masked. Cabinet painting in a kitchen that is still being lived in takes containment seriously, and the plastic is off by the evening the boxes are finished.
A written quote from us names the number of doors, drawer fronts and boxes, the material, the prep including any grain fill or stripping, which primer and which topcoat family, how many coats, the colour, any hardware work, and the price. Two quotes that list those things can be compared. A single number for painting the kitchen cannot.
For 2026, Ontario market figures put most whole kitchens somewhere from $2,500 to $5,500. A small kitchen may start near $1,500, a large or two-tone kitchen goes from $6,000 to $9,000 or more, and a single door runs about $130 to $250. Those figures describe the market. The quote we write is the number for the kitchen in front of us.
A typical Kingston kitchen needs us in the house for two or three days and keeps the doors at the booth for five to seven, so the whole thing spans seven to twelve days. The kitchen keeps working. Sink, stove and fridge stay put and the open boxes hold the dishes. From the first phone call, including the visit and the quote, plan on two to three weeks. Cabinet spray painting explains why the booth time is not wasted time.
Dry time and cure time are different things. Touch-dry comes in hours and the doors can be hung within a day, but a waterborne enamel takes about a week to reach normal use and up to thirty days to reach full hardness. A 2K polyurethane is cured in about a day. With either product, gentle hands and nothing abrasive are the rule for the week after kitchen cabinet painting.
If the kitchen is sound and the colour is the problem, cabinet painting is the answer, and the visit that prices it is free. Book the visit or phone +1 (613) 706-5129 and give a rough count of doors. The Kingston Cabinet Painting home page covers the other cabinets in the house, from vanities to built-ins.
Whatever else in the house has doors and drawers gets prepped, primed and sprayed the same way.
A pre-sale refresh is a painted kitchen scheduled around a listing date, in a neutral colour that photographs well, with the vanity and hardware handled in the same visit so the house is camera-ready in two to three weeks.
See Pre-Sale Refresh
Oak cabinet painting seals golden oak's tannin with a shellac primer, then fills the open grain or leaves it on show, and finishes doors and boxes in a sprayed modern colour so a 1990s kitchen looks built this year.
See Oak Cabinets
Cabinet spray painting runs the doors and drawer fronts through an off-site filtered booth and the boxes through sealed containment in the kitchen, the only cabinet painting method that produces a factory-smooth surface.
See Spray Painting
Two-tone work gives the island, or the whole lower run, a deep colour like navy, green or charcoal while the perimeter stays light, and an island by itself can be done as a small stand-alone job.
See Two-Tone and Islands
Melamine, laminate and thermofoil doors are slick from the factory, so their cabinet painting starts with a bonding primer and finishes with hard sprayed enamel, and it holds on any door whose surface is still tight to the board.
See Thermofoil and Melamine
In a condo galley or L-shape the fronts leave for spraying and the boxes take a single contained day indoors. The unit stays usable, and cabinet painting works around the building's rules on elevators and parking.
See Condo Kitchens
Refinishing suits good hardwood that should stay on show: stripping or sanding removes the old finish, stain follows if the colour is changing, and the grain is sealed under a sprayed clear topcoat.
See Refinishing
When the boxes are sound but the doors are not, refacing fits a full set of new doors and drawer fronts, or replaces just the few past saving, and old and new get painted together so nothing looks different.
See Refacing and New Doors
A vanity is a small piece that lives in steam and splashes, so it gets the kitchen treatment of degreasing, priming and sprayed enamel, is finished inside two days, and is often booked with a kitchen.
See Bathroom Vanities
Hardware work covers filling the old handle holes, drilling fresh ones with a jig after the paint has cured, swapping slamming hinges for soft-close, and fitting knobs or pulls in brass, black or nickel.
See Hardware and Hinges
Pantries, laundry runs, mudroom lockers, bookcases, wall units and mantels are fixed in place, so their cabinet painting is done on site inside sealed containment, using the same products a kitchen gets.
See Pantries and Built-Ins
A colour consultation narrows the shortlist to two or three colours, sprays a full sample door in each, and checks them under the kitchen's real light so the finished result matches the choice.
See Colour ConsultationA visit to the house, a door count and a written quote, with no fee and nothing owed if the answer is no.
Tell us what you can about the kitchen, and we phone to arrange the visit. Sending the form takes nothing more than a name and a number. If talking is easier, the number to dial is +1 (613) 706-5129.
