Monroe, NC · since 2000
Kitchen Remodeling in Charlotte, NC
Kitchen remodeling across the Charlotte area. Cabinets refinished, refaced or replaced, plus granite, backsplash, islands and lighting — and the paint, by the crew that built it.
- 3routes, priced honestly
- 25years in one county
- 1crew, start to finish
Three routes
Refinish, reface, replace. Only one of them is yours.
Almost every kitchen call is really one question: how far do we have to go? The honest answer is decided by the cabinet boxes and by whether the layout works, not by the budget you started with.
The boxes stay. Doors and drawer fronts come off, get sprayed, and come back. The biggest visual change for the least disruption.
- Doors and fronts sprayed off-site
- Boxes degreased, primed and painted in place
- New hardware, old holes filled and redrilled
- You keep your sink and range throughout
New doors and fronts on the existing boxes, with the box faces veneered to match. For when you want a different door style but the layout is fine.
- New door and drawer-front style
- Existing boxes kept and refaced
- Usually paired with new tops and backsplash
- Shorter down time than a full replacement
Everything out. New boxes, new layout if you want one, new tops, new backsplash, new lighting.
- Islands added or a peninsula removed
- Walls opened where the structure allows
- Granite templated once the bases are level
- The room repainted at the end by the same crew
The order it happens in
Why the tops cannot be ordered first.
A kitchen has a fixed sequence, and most of the delay people blame on a contractor is really a supplier lead time that was triggered too late. Here is the real order and where the waiting happens.
Walk it and decide the route
We look at the boxes, the layout and how you actually use the room, then price refinish, reface or replace in writing so you can see the difference rather than guess at it.
Tear-out and repair
Out come the old tops and, on a replacement, the boxes. This is where the surprises live: a soft floor at the dishwasher, a leak behind the sink base, wiring that has been added to since 1987.
Bases set, then template
Granite cannot be templated until the base cabinets are in and level. That is the fixed point in the schedule; the fabrication window runs from that date, not from the day you signed.
Tile, hardware, paint
Backsplash set and grouted, hardware fitted, then the walls, ceiling and trim painted last so nothing lands on a finished surface.
What decides the answer
Nine things we look at before quoting a kitchen.
Read down the middle column. If most of your answers sit in the left-hand result, a refinish will genuinely make you happy. If they sit right, paint is not your problem.
| What we check | Points to refinishing | Points to replacing |
|---|---|---|
| Cabinet boxes | Solid ply or well-made particle board, square, doors hang true | Swollen, sagging shelves, delaminating at the sink base |
| Layout | You like where everything is | You walk around the island to reach the fridge |
| Door style | Shaker or flat panel you can live with | Heavy raised-panel cathedral doors you cannot |
| Interiors | Clean, dry, good shelf pins | Water damage under the sink |
| Storage | Enough drawers, enough depth | No drawer bank, no pantry, wasted corners |
| Counters | Being replaced anyway | Being replaced anyway — neutral |
| Appliances | Fit the current openings | New sizes that the openings will not take |
| Floor | Runs under the cabinets | Stops at the toe kick, so a rip-out means new flooring |
| Down time | You cannot lose the kitchen | You can live without it for a defined stretch |
One kitchen, cherry to white
The same room, four photographs apart.
Our own job. Dark raised-panel cherry cabinets, refinished white, with black granite and a subway-tile backsplash.
Where we do this
Charlotte, and about fifty miles around it.
The shop is in Monroe. The crew works across Charlotte and the towns around it, on both sides of the state line. Each area has its own page, because the houses are not the same.
On the record
What you can check for yourself.
We would rather publish four facts you can verify than a page of adjectives. Everything below links to the source that holds it.
Should I refinish my cabinets or replace them?
Look at the boxes, not the doors. If the carcasses are solid, square and laid out the way you want to cook, refinishing gives you most of the visual change for far less disruption. If the layout is the thing you hate, no amount of paint fixes it. The full comparison, including what each route actually costs to run, is in this guide.
Do refinished cabinets actually hold up?
Yes, when the prep is right: degreased, scuff-sanded, bonding-primed and sprayed with a hard enamel rather than brushed with wall paint. The failures people have seen are almost always latex wall paint straight onto a greasy door. Treat the finished surface like any painted surface — wipe it, do not scour it.
Can I use my kitchen while you are working?
Partly, and we plan for it. On a refinish the doors come off and go away to be sprayed, so you lose the doors but keep the sink, the range and the counters. On a full replacement you lose the kitchen for the stretch between tear-out and install, and we tell you that date range in writing before you commit.
Do you do the granite as well?
Yes — tops, undermount sinks and the tile backsplash that goes with them. Templating happens after the base cabinets are set and level, which is one of the fixed dates in the schedule you get.
Can you change the layout, not just the finishes?
Yes. Islands added, a peninsula taken out, a wall opened into the dining room, lighting moved. That is a remodeling job with a kitchen on the end of it, and it needs a conversation about what is in the wall before anything is promised.
Who paints the room when the kitchen is done?
We do, and that is the point. The walls, ceiling and trim are finished by the same crew on the same contract, so the caulk lines, the cut-in at the new backsplash and the touch-ups after the install are somebody's actual job rather than an argument between two companies.
Get a free estimate
Send a photo of the kitchen you have.
It will not get you a price — we do not quote from photographs — but it will tell us which of the three routes is worth talking about before we drive out.