Love the look of shaker cabinets, but don't love the price tag of a full cabinet door replacement?
You can turn your slab cabinets into shaker cabinets easily and affordably. We recently gave our bathroom a face lift and I couldn’t stand the look of our plywood slab doors. Here’s a step by step guide on exactly how I did my DIY shaker cabinet doors.
Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let’s take a look at what we started with.
Gather Materials For Your DIY Shaker Cabinets
For the trim, I used unfinished lattice boards that I got at the lumberyard. The boards measured 2 1/4 inches wide and were 1/4 inches thick.
What You'll Need
Prep Your Cabinet Doors
Using a screw driver or a drill, remove your cabinet doors from the cabinets. You will also need to take off the hinges and knobs or pulls.
Thoroughly clean the face of your cabinets. I use LA’s Totally Awesome all purpose cleaner. The point of this step is just to take off any grease or oils sitting on the surface of the cabinet doors.
Next, sand your surface. Sanding will help the wood glue adhere better. Use the 100 grit across any surface that you will be either painting or applying glue to.
I wanted to keep that area as rough as possible so that the glue had a good surface to adhere to.
Measure and Cut Your Shaker Style Trim
Standard shaker style cabinet doors have the two side pieces running the entire height of the door. This leaves the horizontal top and bottom pieces of trim sandwiched in between the vertical pieces on the sides.
Like so…
Take your measurements carefully! A sixteenth of an inch doesn’t seem like a lot, but in carpentry, you will see it in your unfinished product!
Carefully cut all your pieces of trim. If you are an amateur carpenter, it is better to err on the side of cutting your pieces a little too long. You can always shave it down a little bit, but you can’t make the board longer!
Then, on to the dry fit!
TOP TIP: Do not skip dry fitting your trim pieces together! It might seem like a silly step but it WILL save you time and plenty of headache in the end.
Dry fitting is just like it sounds. Once you have your trim pieces cut, place them on your cabinet door and make sure everything lines up before you open up that bottle of glue.
Your trim pieces should fit together really snug. Make sure to mark your pieces during the dry fit. That way, you know that each trim piece will go back in the exact same spot as when you did your dry fit.
TOP TIP: Mark your pieces during the dry fit.
Glue Your Trim Pieces
Once you’ve done your dry fit and all the pieces look like they fit together well, it’s time to glue those beauties into place!
Apply your wood glue liberally to the back of the trim piece and the door itself. Be sure to smooth it out over the entire surface with an old brush.
The glue will start to dry very quickly so work fast assembling your trim pieces onto the cabinet door.
Clamp It Down
Clamps are very helpful. Not only do they hold your trim in place, they prevent the two pieces of wood from separating while the glue is drying, which, unfortunately, does happen.
I used 6 inch spring clamps like these
If you don’t want to splurge on clamps, you can try putting something heavy, like concrete blocks, on top to weigh it down
Wait
Wait for the glue to set completely. The wood glue instructions typically say that it dries within 2-3 hours. But if you can exercise patience, you will be rewarded
My husband's uncle does this for a living and he recommended to keep them clamped overnight.
Since I am not the most patient, I waited 4 hours and released the clamps. Mine did stay together pretty well. However, I did notice a couple of spots where the wood separated after a few more hours.
TOP TIP: Keep the clamps on and let your wood glue set overnight..
Keep an eye on your cabinet doors as they dry. You may notice some of the glue starting to pop out the sides. If you can catch it while it’s still wet, you can just wipe it off with a paper towel.
Caulk
Unless you are a top notch carpenter, It is likely that you will notice gaps between your boards. If you plan on painting, you can easily fill these in with caulk.
Paint
Now you’re ready to paint (or stain)! If you're painting your cabinets, primer is always a good idea. Primer helps ensure maximum adhesion of the paint to your cabinet surface.
The best paint that I have used for cabinets is Benjamin Moore’s Advance Interior Paint. It is water based so it’s easy to clean up and the smell isn’t super strong. But, it dries really hard and smooth so it is perfect for cabinets, trim, and doors!
For the best finish possible, it is recommended that you lightly sand with 220 grit sandpaper in between coats.
I just used a regular brush on these cabinets and it came out super smooth. But, if you’re project is larger and you want to use a roller, give these rollers a try for a super smooth finish.
Enjoy Your DIY Shaker Cabinets
Once the paint has dried, you’re ready to re-install and admire all your hard work! Here's how mine turned out.
This post was all about how to refinish slab cabinets into DIY shaker style cabinet doors. I hope this was helpful and would love to hear how your own DIY cabinet doors come out!