Cabinet Refacing

Keeping the Boxes, Changing Everything You See

Cabinet refacing replaces the parts of a cabinet you look at and touch, and keeps the parts you do not. The doors and drawer fronts are new. The face frames and exposed end panels get a new veneer or a painted finish to match. Hinges, pulls and usually the drawer boxes are replaced as well. The boxes themselves, the part fastened to your walls and floor, stay where they are.

For a lot of 1980s kitchens in Carlsbad, that is exactly the right trade. Builders in La Costa and Calavera Hills commonly installed framed cabinets with solid oak face frames and doors. Forty years on, the finish has yellowed and the doors look their age, but the boxes are often dry, square and firmly anchored. Tearing out sound cabinets to install new ones in the same positions is an expensive way to get the same shape back.

How to Tell If Your Cabinets Qualify

We check the same things every time, and you can look at most of them yourself before we arrive.

• The sink base. Look at the floor of the cabinet under the sink. A firm, flat panel is a good sign. Swelling, soft spots or a stained, bubbled bottom means water has been at it, and that box may need replacing even if the rest are fine.
• Squareness. Doors that close evenly and line up with their neighbors suggest the boxes have not racked. Gaps that widen toward the top usually mean a hinge problem, which refacing solves, rather than a box problem.
• Attachment. Upper cabinets should be tight to the wall with no visible gap and no movement when you pull on the face frame.
• Construction. Plywood boxes hold screws and hinges well for decades. Particleboard boxes can be refaced too, but only if the material around the hinge locations is still solid.
• The layout. Refacing does not change where anything is. If the real complaint is the plan, read about our kitchen layout redesign work first.

What Changes During Refacing

Doors and Drawer Fronts

You choose a new door style. Shaker profiles, slab doors and simple recessed panels are the most common choices in these homes because they sit comfortably with the plain architecture of the period. We match veneer or paint to the new doors so face frames and end panels read as one finish.

Hinges and Drawers

Most older cabinets use exposed or semi concealed hinges. We replace them with concealed soft close hinges, which also allow finer adjustment so doors line up properly. Original drawer boxes are often stapled particleboard on side mounted roller slides, and we usually recommend new dovetail drawer boxes on full extension undermount slides with soft close. It is the change people notice most day to day.

Small Layout Adjustments

Refacing is flexible around the edges. A pair of base doors can become a stack of deep drawers. A blind corner can get a pull out. The cabinets hanging over a peninsula can be removed and the end finished, which opens the view to the family room without moving any plumbing.

Coastal and Inland Considerations

Homes closer to the coast and the lagoons deal with the marine layer and more humidity, which is hard on raw wood edges and on cheaper hardware. We seal all cut edges and recommend stainless or well plated pulls where salt air is a factor. Further inland, summer heat is harder on some thermofoil and vinyl wrapped doors, so we steer toward painted or veneered wood in sunny east Carlsbad kitchens.

Timing and Disruption

Refacing is far less disruptive than replacement. Doors and drawers are ordered to measure, which takes a few weeks, and the on site work usually runs a handful of days. Counters normally stay in place during refacing, and the kitchen stays usable most evenings. If new counters are part of the plan, refacing goes first so the counters are templated on the finished cabinets.

Call (760) 846-3858 and we will open your cabinets with you and tell you honestly whether refacing makes sense.