Baby, let's go to Home Depot

[grrltastic]

Trish and I have reached a home-improvement related impasse. Backstory: We live in a shitty, low-rent apartment with a bunch of neighbors who have screaming children and/or (up until last spring) routinely got strung out on meth and rearranged their appliances out on the shared lawn. Situation: our kitchen cabinets suck.

Squirrel pants.

 

They are awful, dark, miserable particle board that is slowly reverting to the pulp from whence it came and the veneer (if you can even call it that) is melting off. The other day it occurred that we should sand/paint the cabinets as a means to make the kitchen more attractive/less gross.

Trish suggested that we go for black or dark brown, as then we would not have to repaint before we moved out.

I suggested that we paint them an avocado color because everyone loves the '70s and also fuck worrying about repainting; the apartment's a shithole and any changes we make can summarily be considered as "improvements" even if said improvements mostly involve drilling a bunch of holes in the walls and installing garden beds made of salvaged 1 x 4s. 

But for reals, I think that painting the cabinets black would make our already tiny, dismal kitchen seem even tinier and dismal-er and that. At the very least, no matter what we do (short of pulling them out and replacing them with alligators or angry bees), we can't make them worse. And also, avocados are delicious..

The most unsettling part is that I don't think we've actually disagreed on anything before. And now it's cabinets.

Lesbians.

Comments

[glamjam]

You're my favorite. ♥

Also, I think avocado would be nifty.

[pinesandmaples]

I agree that dark cabinets would be a terrible step. But I'm your blog friend; I'm supposed to agree with you, right?

[grrltastic]

It is why I keep you people around. <3

[pinesandmaples]

The Farmer would also like to note that laminate won't take paint very well. The paint will flake off or scuff off every few years, worse than wood. But it's a total start. He says, after seeing your picture, that it's worth painting because "that kitchen sucks."

[grrltastic]

Right. It's a terrible solution, but the problem is much worse.

Would sanding the everloving fuck out of it help at all? Would that just exacerbate the problem? We could always hit up the salvaged building materials store and see if they have some less abysmal cabinet doors?

Being poor bites.

[waketosleep]

I think you're best off finding new cabinet doors that are at least paintable. Sanding laminate will just turn it whitish and send laminate dust and grossness into the air and it probably still won't even take primer without streaking.

If your cats aren't the kind of pain that makes it impossible, you could just remove the cabinet doors and do curtain-doors instead? Being in Portland I bet you could find materials for THAT a little cheaper, and then pu the doors back on when you move.

[grrltastic]

My cats are totally the kind of pain that makes that impossible. Murderface's primary hobby is destroying everything beautiful, which is probably what I get for naming her Murderface to begin with.

[waketosleep]

My roommate has a cat like that. Naturally it's not the one named Loki, though. Oh no, it's Basil.

[pinesandmaples]

Contact paper? Cover the cabinets in art projects and modge podge over it?

[waketosleep]

I agree also about dark being way too fucking dark, because you clearly live in one of those late 70s/early 80s economy shitholes and there's never enough light. I understand her argument about going neutral though so I would split the difference and pick a light neutral.

But I also kind of hate that avocado/pea soup green and would not have it in a kitchen.

Can you actually sand and paint those cabinets, though? That looks like shitty faux wood laminate in the picture.

[pinesandmaples]

I am currently living in my partner's dead grandmother's house. The kitchen is harvest gold, with matching sink and dishwasher. The matching fridge and stove were replaced years ago (thank fuck). In the basement is a lovely avocado Maytag washer and matching dryer. The bathrooms were powder blue and mauve until we painted one last summer. Now it's got harvest gold flooring, a burgundy countertop, and nice light gray paint. The other bathroom has mauve and powder blue tile halfway up the wall. It's charming.

Tomorrow, we're going to rip the royal blue shag carpet out of one of the bedrooms. It's covering a beautiful red oak wood floor.

[waketosleep]

You can really find a lot of home decoration war crimes in every decade. And then they tend to combine like some kind of decor-Voltron but even more garish.

[grrltastic]

I like this idea of decor-Voltron and wish to subscribe to your publication.

[grrltastic]

It is very shitty faux wood laminate. You have a really good eye.

I come from the school of "put enough primer on it and you can paint anything." Improved living environments through brute force.

[waketosleep]

I have seen a lot of shitty laminate in my day and can spot it from fifty paces.

[switterbeet]

Last three sentences cracked me up like eggs for an omelette. XD

I also side on the "dark colours make spaces small-and-seamy-seeming". I'd go fifties blue though, because: sky!