90s Kitchen Remodel - DIY Kitchen Renovation

painted 90s oak cabinets - kitchen renovation

Ohhhh the 90s. Those Beautiful Orange oak cabinets, the porcelain tile countertops, Lanoleum floors… you know what Im talking about. A real thing of BEAUTY. Now, I grew up in a late 90s built home, and back then these were NICE finishes. but just like with those fancy pink toilets of the 50’s, the trends soon fade, and were onto the new!

We bought our home at the start of the pandemic. (Im talking unloading our things as lock downs went into place- same day.) We handed over the keys to our newer built home we oh so loved, and decided we were going to give a cosmetic fixer a-GO! With a 3 year old, and 4 month of baby in tow. YEEHAW.

It’s been a SLOW process to say the least. What was originally supposed to be a 2 year “flip” somehow turned into 4 years, an additional baby, and no real push to actually leave. I’ve discovered that turning a house to home certainly takes time, and my husband and I have learned so much as we’ve made our way through bathrooms, laundry room, bedrooms, and now the kitchen.

Transforming the kitchen from its 90s glory to 2024 has been my favorite project to date. There are a few things we need to finish up - but were celebrating that the 95% is done.

Lets roll it back to the beginning here…when we first moved into our home, the kitchen felt a bit tight. It didn’t boast much counter space - especially with a cooktop in the center of our small Island, but we didn’t have our sights on any kitchen changes till further down the road. Most of our focus was on replacing flooring or updating old toilets. However, the original 90’s refrigerator that came with the place decided otherwise, and upon dying shifted our focus to the kitchen. In ordering a new fridge/freezer we quickly realized after delivery that a new model would not fit in the space that the previous one had… It was time to rework some things.

We decided first and foremost that combining our oven/cooktop back into one piece would not only open the island to be a completely free work space - but would also allow for space to open up on our far right wall for the fridge to fit! Basically swapping the fridge and oven, and eliminating the cooktop - simple enough, right? Sure. After hiring a plumber to move the water for the fridge, and HVAC to move the gas from the island over to where the old fridge used to be, we were in business….

It was in this same moment (still in 2020) that we slapped a piece of plywood over the gapping hole of our center Island, and completely ignored the kitchen till 2022. We circled back to completing our bathrooms, laundry room, and replaced flooring throughout the house - check the blog for details on those projects!

NOW for the fun part!

In January of 2022 we were FINALLY able to shift our focus back to the kitchen. We had completed projects, added another baby to the mix, and I was running out of unstained plywood to cook on - and patience ;)

We began by tearing our counter tops, and added a cabinet to the side of our range to finish it off, and make it look as if it was meat to be in that spot all along. We had already picked slab counter tops - we used a local company to us, Pacific NW Marble & Granite - and they were scheduled to come out for measurement and install. The counters I selected are quartz, and the color is white Misterio. We’ve had quartz in previous homes and they hold up beautifully for the price. It was between counter demo, and counter install that we painted our cabinetry. I would have loved to try and strip the wood and whitewashed the cabinets to have kept the wood finish while eliminating the orange. But with it being the dead of winter in the Pacific Northwest, and the time crunch of counter installation, we opted for painting!

We sprayed the cabinet boxes and faces with a primer, and then painted with Sherwin Williams Snowbound -

Counter tops were set shortly after. The coolest part of changing the counter tops, was that we were able to actually extend the overhang of the new counters off of our island making the work space larger than before, and allowing more seating to the end of the island.

Next was an updating of fixtures - a new faucet, a new chandelier over the sink, and new knobs and pulls to the cabinets. Knobs and/or pulls can make such a difference in a space. I liked mixing both knobs and pulls in our kitchen, as well as different lengths of pulls.

HOT TIP - If you’ve never drilled for knobs - I highly recommend using a jig of template for drilling your holes. It made the process so much easier!

The Backsplash of this space is what really made this space COME TO LIFE.

I chose Bedrosians Cloe Square Glossy White 5 in. x 5 in. Ceramic Wall Tile. This project took a bit longer than other tile projects we’ve done. But we were able to complete it in 3 days! Two of the days were spent cutting and applying the tiles.

I did take the time to lay out the tiles, because there is a variance in color and i didn’t want grays to pull too dark in one section, or have more white in another… intentional speratic! lol

My husband would apply grout to the backs of the tiles, i would apply to the wall - then began measuring out the next piece if cuts needed to be made and he’d run it outside and cut it on our tile saw.

The 3rd, and final day was for finishing it off with grout. The grout we used is from The Home Depot - Simple Grout in the shade '“bright white.” It lives up to its name, it really is super simple to apply.

After a day of drying, we were able to get everything back together! It was reapplying the outlet face plates, that i realized we did make a few mistakes on cuts around outlets. Luckily there is a solution for this other than removing and recutting the tiles. HALLELUJAH. The solution: larger face plates. After a run to The Home Depot, and putting up the new plates, nobody but you and I will know what hiding underneath... and I actually love the little bit of added detail they bring to the space!

4 years has felt like an awful long time to still be working on projects around the house. But I’m discovering more and more that making this house of ours a home wont, and does not happen overnight. Looking back at BEFORE photos does remind me of the heck of the long way we’ve come… If DIY and home decor is your thing, subscribe to my email list! Youll get sent the latest as soon as its posted! You can also follow along with the fun in real time on Instagram @justsimplycierra.