Kitchen Countertops and Backsplash

You guys - we have a new kitchen. Seriously, look at the before and after pictures of our kitchen, and the changes are drastic. I thought when I redid the cabinets, that was drastic. But now that we've redone the countertops and backsplash...wow, it looks completely different.

When we moved in, and for the past 3 years, we've had a laminate countertop and backsplash. Here is a look at the kitchen post-cabinet rennovation - pretty good, right?

But I wanted a countertop that better matched our updated cabinets. We have about 50 square feet of countertop, though. We also live in a duplex, which means that whatever we do to our home isn't necessarily going to translate well to home value. So anything we spend on our home has to be weighed with that in mind - ultimately we do things that will add to our personal enjoyment but don't cost an arm and a leg. Which means that the expense of adding real stone countertops was going to be outside our willingness to pay.

As I looked into alternatives, I found this company: Leggari. They do custom epoxy countertop kits (and floor kits). But this isn't your grandma's epoxy (did grandma use epoxy?). They say it was designed to be used in aircraft hangers, so it's some sturdy stuff. They send you a kit of everything you need to do the counters. I didn't get many in-process pictures, because you need to go quickly when working with this stuff, but there are number of videos on their site if you're interested in how we did it. I'll give you a basic rundown here:

1. Tape and plastic off EVERYTHING. You don't want this stuff on your floors or cabinets.

2. Prime the countertops with a two-part primer (rolled on with a nap roller) and let it dry to tacky (about 1 1/2 hours).
3. Mix and pour out a two-part epoxy base on all of the countertops.
4. Use a paint roller like a squeegee, and spread the epoxy over the entire countertop, trying to get it approximately even (it self-levels), going over the sides so it flows evenly when it drips.

5. Once the epoxy base color is on, you mix and pour your accent colors on the wet base one at a time (we used two colors), trying to mimic stone patterns.
6. With everything still wet, you take your roller and roll back and forth, up and down, blurring the harsh lines you created with the accent colors (when we did this, we started too soon at first, because our base coat layer was thicker than expected, so we waited a little while to start).
7. Let the epoxy dry, taking a paint stick to the bottom edges every so often to stop drips from forming on the underside of the counters.
8. The next day, mix, pour, and roll the top coat in a similar fashion to the base coat.
9. Let everything fully cure and harden for about 7 days before you put things back on the counter.


We ran into a snag after everything had dried. I screwed up, and waited too long to scrape drips, accidentally creating a lip at the bottom when I did it once (see picture below). I should have waited and just sanded the drips off the bottom.

Notice the "bump" at the bottom

I ended up sanding that out flat (by hand!), and my artist wife went back and re-painted the sides where I had done that. Made it nice and flat and pretty again. I had a little extra topcoat in the containers, and mixed/rolled that on over the sides. This is what it looked like when everything was dry and we took the plastic and tape off.

We also took the opportunity to replace the kitchen faucet with one that has a pull-down sprayer and has a motion-activated feature.

New faucet pre-backsplash

After we finished the countertops, we moved on to the backsplash. We played around with a couple ideas, including doing subway tile (P.S. tile is expensive!). We finally decided on a nice, relatively inexpensive mosaic tile with an unsanded white cement grout. I bought a tile cutter, a trowel, a float, and a sponge, and over the course of two Saturdays, we first put up the tile, then grouted everything as well.

Putting up tile

Backsplash completed without grout

For the island backsplash, I ended up having to improvise, and cut a lot of tiles lengthwise, because I ran out of the skinny tile rows.

Backsplash on the island

Here are the progress shots of grouting, with my beautiful co-grouter.

First section grouted

Beautiful co-grouter

Ultimately, this kitchen is completely different from when we first started, and I love it.

Before and After

Kitchen Cabinets

This is a follow-up to my last post on the bathroom cabinets. Redoing those gave me courage to refinish our kitchen cabinets. We have a big kitchen. I counted our cabinets, and we have 11 drawers and 27 cabinet doors, so this was a big undertaking.

I had some time off of work coming up, so I planned to get it all done during that time. I almost did it, too. If only the sanding had taken less time. I only planned for one day of sanding, but ended up taking three.

The process was essentially the same as the bathroom cabinets. First I took all the doors and drawer faces off, then the hinges and handles (which ended up taking about two hours just for that). This time I left the slides on, though, because the soft close slides take a lot more effort to take off / put on than the ones we have in the bathroom. Then I sanded.

All the doors and drawer faces off and sanded (along the wall)

I bought a quarter sheet sander, and spent three part days (about 4-6 hours each day was all I could take) sanding the cabinet doors and drawer faces, and then the faces of the cabinets themselves. It was quite an undertaking, and I listened to the cast recording of Hamilton about four times. Kristen helped me wipe them down, then I taped down plastic to the dining room and living room floors where the drawers/doors would be.

My original plan was to do two coats the first day - one first thing in the morning, and then one about 8 hours later. However, the first coat ended up taking me about 5 hours, instead of the expected 2-3, so that was out. I did the second coat on day 2 (took about 3.5 hours that time), then took a break on day 3 and did the third coat on day 4 (about 2 hours). I then finished off with the final coat on day 6 (about 2 hours).

After one coat

Four coats, before I painted the sides of the cabinets

I let them dry for five days before applying the two top coats. I decided to apply the finish on one side and let it dry before flipping it over, instead of using the painter's pyramids to do both sides in one pass. That way, there would be no marring of the finish from handling it (though it added some time). I originally wanted to finish the cabinets before Christmas, but that didn't happen. So then I wanted to be done before we left for Portland on the 29th - also didn't happen. But I did get two coats on the front and one coat on the back before we left. After we got back to Minnesota, I did the final coat and reattached everything.

Shiny topcoat v. no topcoat

Now, I also have laminate portions of the cabinets. Instead of real wood, they put up laminate on the some of the sides. For that, I put on two coats of General Finishes Milk Paint (the Dark Chocolate color matches their Java Gel Stain), then added a couple topcoats of the polyurethane gel (even though the paint says it doesn't need a topcoat). And there we have it - refinished kitchen cabinets! Here are a couple angles.

Kitchen Cabinetry

This has been a project that has ended up taking longer than expected. But what else is new? I have a friend from work who is an engineer, and he and his engineering buddies were talking about how they seemed to always be multiplying things by pi (you know, π). Anyway, he found that it always takes him about 3 times as long to do a project as he originally thinks it will take him, which I totally relate to. He calls it the "Pi effect," a term which I will now be using. 

So we love our house, but we don't love a few things about it - hence the projects. One of those things is the golden oak color of the woodwork. And there is a lot of it in the kitchen. Now this post isn't about how we've painted or stained our cabinets (that's yet to come), but we felt we could do something else to help us like our kitchen a little better. Hardware!

We've always wanted soft close cabinets and drawers. They're just so cool. So after a lot of research, I bought some soft close attachments for the cabinet hinges. These were made specially to attach to the type of hinges we already had, so putting them on only took about 15 minutes. Yay!

This is the hardware attachment 

This is how they close now

Then came the part that took forever. Drawer slides. These can be expensive, so after an extensive search, I found them online for about $10 a set (normally around $20 for the 22-inch length we needed). When I got them, I realized I needed a bracket that fit on the back of the cabinet to which I could attach the slides. Ordered those for about $15 (for all of them). When they got here, we realized they were the wrong size and contacted the company. They were very helpful and said they would send the right ones.

 

These are the old slides

On the drawer 

After two weeks, I contacted them again and asked if the correct brackets had gotten shipped (they hadn't, and so they shipped them). So five weeks after originally ordering, I had everything I needed. I took that week to install them (it took me about 20-30 min per drawer to install), and then realized one of the slides was broken. Back online. At this point I'm sure the support person is sick of me. She sends me a new slide, and now I finally have them all done!

The installation process can take a while when you're retrofitting
older cabinets - especially when you're trying to make sure they stay level.

The brackets I needed to attach the slides to the back of the cabinets

Broken slide

The new slides catch really well, which can make it a little difficult to open the drawers - remember what I said about making it look nice? We had planned to add cabinet pulls, so after multiple trips to multiple hardware stores (my life lately) we bought some. Of course, when I go to install them, I drill some holes in a drawer and realize the provided screws are too short. Back to the store, then an hour and a half of installing pulls.

But now they're all done, and they look great!

The drawers (with pulls attached) closing very nicely