Cabinet Painting in Worcester, MA.

Only about one in ten housing units in the city was built in 2000 or later. That means most kitchens here are either original to an older building or have been remodeled at some point over the past several decades. Either way, it is common to find cabinet boxes that are still structurally sound under a finish that looks dated: honey oak, yellowed white paint, or worn clear coat around the handles.

Painting keeps the layout, the counters and the plumbing where they are, and changes what you see every day. The trade-off is that a cabinet finish takes far more abuse than a wall, so the result depends almost entirely on cleaning, sanding and primer choice.

Refinish or replace: a quick way to decide

Cabinets are good candidates for paint when the boxes are solid wood or plywood, the doors are flat and not delaminating, and you are happy with where everything sits. Replacement starts to make more sense when the boxes are water-damaged particleboard under the sink, the doors are peeling thermofoil, or you want to move the range or add an island.

Our cabinet painting vs. replacement article goes through the trade-offs in more depth.

• Good to paint: solid wood or plywood boxes, sound doors, a layout you like
• Paint with caution: MDF doors with swollen edges, laminate that needs a bonding primer
• Usually replace: peeling thermofoil, rotted sink bases, a plan to change the layout

Old painted cupboards and lead

The city counts 33,231 housing units built before 1940, and apartments of that age may still have built-in cupboards, pantry shelving or china cabinets with decades of paint on them. In a pre-1978 home, those coats may contain lead, and sanding a cabinet door is exactly the kind of work that creates fine dust in a room where food is prepared.

When we refinish older painted cabinetry, the doors and drawer fronts come out to be prepped under controlled conditions where possible, and in-place boxes are handled with plastic containment, wet methods and HEPA cleanup. Federal rules treat more than six square feet of disturbed paint in a room as a lead-safe job, and a full kitchen easily passes that. Details are on our lead-safe painting page.

How the finish is built

A cabinet job is closer to furniture finishing than wall painting. Cooking residue keeps primer from bonding, so every surface is degreased before sanding. Then comes a primer chosen for the substrate: a bonding primer for slick factory finishes and laminate, a shellac-based or stain-blocking primer for oak, whose tannins can bleed through white paint. The topcoat is a hard-curing enamel, sprayed on doors for a smooth surface and brushed or sprayed on frames.

Oak's open grain shows through paint unless it is filled. Some owners like that texture; others want a flat, smooth look, which takes extra grain-filling steps. Decide before work starts, because it changes the time involved. Our cabinet painting process post covers each stage.

Kitchens in multi-unit buildings

About one in three housing units in the city is in a building with two to four apartments, and a three-decker has three stacked kitchens. An owner can refresh one unit's cabinets between tenants and do the others later. Matching the same color and sheen across units keeps future touch-ups simple, and a durable enamel holds up better to tenant turnover than standard wall paint.

If you live in one unit and rent the others, the work can be staged so your own kitchen is out of service for the shortest time. Owners in three-decker areas such as Grafton Hill or near Shrewsbury Street can find neighborhood notes on those pages.