Let’s talk counter tops!

The Kitchen. I don’t think we’ve spent more time or money on any other room – and I think any contractor or renovation expert would say that’s where your money is going to go. We started out with a grand plan of completely gutting and reworking the entire kitchen. That didn’t quite fit into our budget. So we relied on the next best thing to help with our transformation – Paint!

We have painted (or had professional help painting) the ceiling, walls and cabinets. Eric and I have changed every hinge on every door and replaced all the hardware. The last thing on our list was the counter tops. We’ve mulled over replacing them with everything from granite (too expensive) to concrete to butcher block. After hours of research, we decided to give a good college try at painting them.

I found this product through my endless Google searches for good ideas:

This is different than Rust-oleum’s Countertop Transformations – that is a much more expensive product. With the Countertop Coating you can have it tinted in 16 color options:

We have 3 counter tops to renovate in this kitchen. We decided to start with one and see how we liked it. We chose to go with Gray Mist for the color. A few before pictures…

I can’t overemphasize how important the prep work is for a project like this. If you’re going to try it, go ahead and do the prep work: tape off the walls, cover the cabinets, scrub down the dirt from the counter. I know, I know… you won’t drip a single drop on those newly-painted cabinets. Sure, you won’t.

Here we are, ready for paint:

The paint goes on very thin. It’s almost watery. You must use a foam roller with this paint and I learned by the third coat that it’s a great idea to squeeze the foam roller into the paint and get it really full before applying it to the counter. The fumes are crazy! You need open windows and a fan blowing for full ventilation.

Here’s the first few passes on the first coat of Gray Mist:

The paint takes 24 hours to dry, but it becomes tacky very quickly. Once it’s down, there’s no going back to touch up! We were generally pleased with the first coat, but decided that the color was too light. So we went back to our trusty Lowe’s (where they know us by name, sort of like in Cheers) and decided that the Pewter color was a better fit for us.

I did two more coats of the Pewter, letting each dry for 24 hours, and we ended up with this:

Can’t wait to show you the other two counters when we get them done! 🙂