One question decides it, and it is not about the doors. Does your layout work? If the sink, the range and the fridge are where you want them and the boxes are sound, refacing gets you a new kitchen. If the plan is the problem, no door will fix it.
Refacing is commonly quoted at 40 to 60 percent below full replacement, because the boxes, the plumbing and the layout all stay put. On timing the gap is wider still: three to five days on site against three to eight weeks for a full replacement, depending on whether the new cabinets are stock, semi-custom or built to order.
The upheaval matters more than people expect when they are comparing numbers on paper. Through a reface the sink and appliances stay connected and the kitchen is usable most evenings, so normal life carries on around the work. A full replacement takes the room out of service, and that is weeks of eating differently rather than days.
Before looking at a single door we ask what you would change about how the kitchen works. If the answer involves moving anything, the conversation is about new cabinetry, not refacing.
Open the sink base
We check the frames for swelling, rot and rack, and press the panel beside the dishwasher. This is where the honest answer usually comes from, and it takes about ten minutes.
Price the mixed option
Where one run has failed and the rest is sound, we quote new boxes for that run and refacing for everything else. It is often the cheapest route and almost nobody asks for it unprompted.
Say no where it applies
If refacing is wrong for your kitchen you hear it at that visit, before any deposit. A refaced kitchen over failing boxes is a complaint waiting to happen, and it is not work we want.
Four hard limits
Four Things Refacing Cannot Fix
It cannot move anything. The sink stays on its plumbing, the range stays on its circuit, and the fridge stays in its opening. If the reason you dislike the kitchen is that you have to cross it to get from the sink to the stove, refacing will not touch that.
It cannot widen a run, so a new range that needs an extra three inches means new boxes. It cannot fix failed board, meaning particleboard that has swelled under a leak or sagging shelves that have given up. And it cannot rescue a box that carries a smell, because the smell is in the material.
Any one of those points at custom cabinets. But it is usually one run, not the kitchen, and then the answer is both: new boxes there, refacing everywhere else, or painting if the doors are sound.
Recent work
Both routes
Refacing and Replacement in Detail
The two options side by side, plus the material pages that decide which one your boxes allow.
The decision, the money, and the middle option most people do not know exists.
Ask whether you would change the layout. If the sink, range and fridge are where you want them and the boxes are solid, square and dry, reface. If you want to move something, widen a run or open a wall, replace.
Typically 40 to 60 percent below full replacement, because the boxes, plumbing and layout stay put. Example range, not a quote. The saving narrows if several runs need new boxes regardless.
Three to five days on site for a reface, against three to eight weeks for a full replacement depending on whether the cabinets are stock, semi-custom or built to order. Both have a build lead time before that.
Yes, and it is often the right answer. Where one run has water damage it gets new boxes and the rest is refaced to match. Done well the join is invisible, and it costs far less than replacing everything.
It changes what a buyer sees, which is most of the first impression, at a fraction of replacement cost. What it will not do is fix a layout a buyer dislikes. If the plan is the objection, refacing is not the answer to it.
Yes. Keeping the boxes means the carcasses do not go to landfill, which is a meaningful volume from a full kitchen. It is a genuine advantage, though not a reason to reface boxes that have failed.
Age alone is not disqualifying. We have refaced kitchens from the fifties where the boxes were solid wood and better built than anything since. What matters is the condition of the frames, not the year they went in.
Regularly. Sagging particleboard, water damage, metal cabinets and boxes carrying a smell that will not clean out are all better replaced, and you hear that at the consultation rather than after a deposit.
I came in wanting a full replacement. They measured, said the layout already worked, and refaced it for a fraction of what I had budgeted.
Cordula B.
Edmonton
★★★★★
The honest part was being told what refacing would not fix. The corner still wastes space and they said so before I signed anything.
Adaeze U.
st. Albert
★★★★★
I wanted the sink moved. They said plainly that refacing could not do it and quoted new cabinetry instead. No attempt to sell me the cheaper job that would not have worked.
Amrit S.
Sherwood Park
★★★★
Helpful and clear about the trade-offs. The mixed option of new boxes on one run was not something I knew to ask for, and it saved us a lot.
Fiona McL.
Edmonton
From the blog
Edmonton cabinet guides
Written for homeowners working out whether to reface, paint or start again.
Ten minutes with the sink base open usually settles it. We measure the runs, check the frames, and quote whichever route is right, including the mixed option where one run has failed.
