Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Medicine Cabinet Revamp

When we first moved in, the bathtub and toilet were beige... yuck. Since then, our landlord has updated our toilet to the low-flow variety and hallelujah, it's white. We can't do anything about the tub for now, but it's not so bad.. We could always close the curtains when people come over if we thought it was that bad.

So.

The medicine cabinet.

I think someone painted it beige once upon a time to match the beige toilet and tub. Whoever that "someone" was did a crap-tastic job of painting it. Since we now have a white toilet and sink, I figured I'd paint the cabinet white to match. Maybe if the cabinet were painted beige and done well, or painted white and done poorly, I would've left it alone... but a crappy beige paint job? Not in my bathroom!

Here's a before picture. It doesn't look that bad right?


Look closer....ewww


If you that thought that was gross, check out this close up! I thought Riley was my only pet.. turns out I was housing a litter of dust bunnies on my medicine cabinet!


Usually, I would use a reuseable wipe to clean up messes, some messes just call for disposables...


Note: In my excited haze, I forgot to take pictures from here on out lol...
After wiping down the surfaces, I sanded the front and edges of the cabinet door and the sides of the cabinet back. I used a slightly damp sponge to wipe away the sanding debris. I used painter's tape around the edges of the mirror and then taped old flyers to the front of the mirror. I used Krylon white primer - sprayed one coat - and waited about 1 hour before spraying 2 coats of Krylon white glossy paint. While I was waiting the paint to dry, I read the side of the spray can. It say, "Best results when air and surface temperature is 50ºF (10ºC) - 90ºF (32ºC) and humidity below 85%." Ummmmmmmmmmmm, if you don't live in Toronto or know what the weather was like here yesterday:

Source
Definitely not above 10ºC and it was drizzling. Spray painting FAIL! 

In case you're wondering what kind of DIYer I am, I'm the messy, impulsive, fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind. This is what the bathroom looked like while I was painting the cabinet. My other half is a very orderly person and was less than impressed by the state of the bathroom when he got home from work... 


I'm impatient and wanted to help along my cabinet in this cold wet weather, so I brought down my blow dryer and had at it for about 10 minutes. By 10:30pm, I was reattaching the cabinet to the wall and revelling in all its new white glossy glory :-D


Here are some before and after shots.



 Before and after straight on



 Before and after zoomed in side shots (same spot)
 




Before and after side shot


Obviously I'm biased, but I think it looks so much better! Why didn't I do this sooner??!

3 comments:

  1. Yeah, it does look so much better! I can picture exactly what Kevin's expression was when he walked in on that mess haha! Are you going to switch out the handle eventually? I'm jealous of people with handles on cabinets because it's an easy fix and my crappy rental cupboards are all the kind with a groove of wood at the bottom of the door to pull open. No quick fix :( I'm thinking of taking the doors right off and lining the inside with old migratory bird maps (kitchen cupboards, not bathroom).

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  2. I thought about switching out the handle on the cabinet, but the handles on the second cabinet (you can just see the edge of it in the last "after" picture) are white, as are the handles on our faucets. I saw some really cool revamps for medicine cabinets that included fun stuff on the inside of the door! One was a sign that said something funny like, "Hello Gorgeous!"

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  3. Hehe that would make me laugh every morning (which is quite a feat - so not a morning person)

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