The custom homes that replaced Willowdale's bungalows hold some of the largest kitchens in Toronto, often with 50 or more doors in lacquer, polyester or painted MDF. Cabinet painting refreshes those kitchens for a fraction of what new custom millwork costs.
From the 1990s onward, owners and builders took down the original one-story bungalows on 40- to 50-foot lots and built two-story homes of 4,000 square feet or more in their place. The wave ran hardest through the 2000s and 2010s, and it changed whole blocks in Willowdale East, Willowdale West, Lansing and Newtonbrook. The kitchens in those homes were built to impress, and now many look their age.
Most doors are MDF, either flat slab or a routed shaker profile, finished at the shop in high-gloss lacquer, polyester or a factory paint. Some owners chose wood-grain veneer in espresso, walnut or wenge tones instead. Boxes are usually melamine-lined plywood or particleboard with full-extension drawers.
The layout is big. Uppers run to a ten-foot ceiling, often stacked with a second row of small doors on top. Islands run eight to twelve feet with drawers on both sides. There is often a tall pantry wall, a built-in fridge panel and a servery or bar. Many homes also have a second working kitchen behind the main one, used for heavy cooking, and a third in the basement.
A kitchen with 60 openings cannot go through a booth in one load. We split the doors into two or three batches and rehang the first batch before the second goes out, so the kitchen is never fully bare.
That also means the cabinet painting quote reads larger than a bungalow kitchen, and it should. The count is the price driver, not a markup. A 60-door kitchen off Churchill Avenue simply takes more hours than a 20-door bungalow kitchen a few streets over. On the plus side, flat MDF doors spray faster per door than raised panel oak, so the rate per opening often sits at the lower end of the Toronto range.
A back working kitchen and a basement kitchen belong in one cabinet painting booking with the main room. Many Willowdale custom homes have a small, enclosed kitchen behind the main kitchen where the heavy cooking happens, plus a full kitchen in the basement for family or a rental suite.
Those rooms usually carry the same doors as the main kitchen but take far more grease and steam. The working kitchen needs the strongest degreasing on the job and often a two-part topcoat. Doing all three rooms in one booking keeps the colour identical and cuts the setup cost for each room.
Each kitchen gets a separate line, which shows the main room's cost and exactly what the extra rooms add to the cabinet painting price.
Hard gloss finishes do not accept ordinary primer. We sand the full surface to a dull scratch pattern, fill every chipped edge and corner, and then apply a bonding primer made for lacquer and polyester before the topcoat goes on.
Chips on MDF edges are common near the dishwasher, the garbage pull-out and the drawers under the cooktop. Where MDF has swollen from water, the edge is cut back and filled, or the door is replaced. When a front is beyond repair, cabinet refacing and door replacement explains the next step.
Cabinet painting a large infill kitchen usually runs $6,500 to $10,000, and a very large one with a second kitchen can go higher. A new custom kitchen of the same size easily passes $45,000 once doors, boxes, hardware and installation are counted.
The stone counters, the built-in appliances and the plumbing all stay where they are. That matters in a house where the counters alone may be worth more than the whole cabinet painting job.
Most owners now choose satin or matte when they repaint a gloss kitchen. A lower sheen hides fingerprints and small dents far better, and it reads calmer in a room with large windows and pot lights.
If you want to keep a high gloss, we can spray one, but it costs more because every flaw in the surface shows. A sample door in each sheen makes the choice easy. Our cabinet colour consultation page describes the process.
Large kitchens are always counted in person. We look at every run, the island, the pantry wall and any second kitchen, and then write a cabinet painting quote that lists batches, primer, topcoat and price. Call +1 (647) 370-5454, book your visit here, or return to our main Willowdale page.
Condo vanities, pantry walls, laundry closets and custom built-ins are primed and topcoated with the kitchen system.
Each front is degreased, scuffed and primed according to its material, then sprayed with a durable topcoat and rehung. With kitchen cabinet painting the whole room gets a new colour, while stone, faucet and tile stay untouched.
See Kitchen Cabinets
Before oak takes colour, it needs a tannin-sealing primer and a firm decision on what happens to its open pores. Handled in that sequence, oak cabinet painting ends up even, smooth and free of brown bleed.
See Oak Cabinets
Certain wood kitchens deserve restoring rather than covering, so refinishing removes the tired finish, shifts the stain tone where needed, and protects the timber with a sprayed clear coat. When the timber is handsome enough to keep on view, it replaces paint altogether.
See Refinishing
Spraying lays primer and topcoat down in thin, even coats that level out smooth, with no roller texture and no brush lines. Cabinet painting done this way looks close to a factory finish and lasts longer at the handles.
See Spray Painting
Shiny factory finishes will accept colour, provided an adhesion primer goes first and the surface remains firmly stuck to its core. Before any thermofoil, melamine or laminate cabinet painting, we inspect each door one by one.
See Thermofoil and Melamine
New doors and drawer fronts can go onto the boxes you already have, sprayed in the same colour as the frames. Think of it as the step between cabinet painting and a complete tear-out.
See Refacing and New Doors
Two-tone means pale wall runs matched with a deeper island or deeper base cabinets, and no cabinet painting layout is asked for more often today. An island can also be painted alone to give an older kitchen a new focus.
See Two-Tone and Islands
No cabinet painting booking is smaller than a bathroom vanity, which most often wraps up within two days. Steam and splashing mean it needs a hard topcoat and a full cure before heavy cleaning.
See Bathroom Vanities
Condo kitchens are small, but building rules, elevator bookings and shared air make the planning bigger than the job. With condo kitchen cabinet work, fronts leave the unit, so daily life inside carries on.
See Condo Kitchens
Pantries, laundry cupboards, mudroom lockers and fitted units receive the primer and topcoat a kitchen would. These units are anchored, so we do the job where they stand, inside sealed sheeting.
See Pantries and Built-Ins
Fresh handles and quiet-closing hinges complete a painted kitchen, and fitting them is easiest when the fronts are down anyway. Unused holes get plugged, new ones are bored off a jig, and hardware goes on after the cabinet painting has hardened.
See Hardware and Hinges
A full door finished in the shade and propped in your kitchen settles what a tiny chip never will. Cabinet painting colour consultation lets you judge true colour on your actual cabinetry, under your actual lighting, before deciding.
See Colour ConsultationA visit covers the door tally, the material check and a written scope. There is no fee for the visit or the quote.
List what you know about the cabinets, house or suite. We phone back to pick a time and need only a name and number. Or reach us directly at +1 (647) 370-5454.
