What cabinet refinishing in Clovis involves
Cabinet refinishing in Clovis changes the color and finish of the cabinets you already own. Your doors, drawer fronts, boxes, and face frames all stay. What changes is everything on the surface: old finish removed or abraded, damage repaired, bonding primer applied, and a new sprayed topcoat laid down. Done properly, the result is a smooth uniform film with no brush marks and no roller texture. Done improperly, with a brush and wall paint, it looks exactly like what it is within six months.
Our refinishing sequence:
- Doors and drawer fronts removed, labeled, and taken to the shop
- Complete degreasing to remove cooking film and hand oils, which is the step most failures skip
- Sanding or chemical stripping depending on the existing finish
- Dent, chip, and grain filling where needed
- Bonding primer formulated for previously finished cabinetry
- Two sprayed topcoats with a sanding pass between them
- Boxes and face frames finished on site with masking and containment
- Rehang, hardware, and full alignment
Signs your cabinets should be refinished rather than replaced
- Solid wood or wood veneer doors that are structurally fine but dated in color
- Honey oak, golden maple, or 1990s cherry that no longer works with your flooring
- Finish that has yellowed, chalked, or worn through at the pulls and around the sink
- A layout you are happy with and boxes that are still square and solid
- A budget that does not stretch to refacing or replacement this year
Refinishing cannot change your door style or your layout. If the raised panel oak profile is the thing you dislike, painting it white gives you painted raised panel oak. That is a real outcome we have to be direct about, because it disappoints people who expected a shaker kitchen.
Our process
Assessment and color consultation
We check what the existing finish is, since factory conversion varnish, lacquer, and thermofoil each demand a different approach. Color samples get viewed in your kitchen under your own lighting.
Removal and labeling
Every door and drawer front is numbered to its opening so everything returns to the exact position it came from.
Shop prep and spray
Degrease, strip or sand, fill, prime, and spray in a controlled environment. This is why the finish comes back smooth.
On site box and frame finishing
Boxes and face frames are masked, contained, and finished in place with the room protected.
Cure time
Finishes need real cure time before hard use. We tell you how long to be gentle rather than pretending it is ready the moment it is dry to the touch.
Rehang and adjust
Doors returned to their labeled openings, hardware fitted, and every door and drawer aligned.
Finish options compared
| Finish | Character | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Sprayed painted (opaque) | Uniform color, hides grain on MDF, shows grain slightly on oak | The most popular choice. On open grain oak we can grain fill first for a fully smooth result, at added cost |
| Stain and clear coat | Keeps the wood visible | Only works when the existing wood is sound and you are going darker. You cannot stain a previously painted door without stripping to bare wood |
| Glaze or antique | Color settled into profile detail | Suits traditional raised panel doors. Reads dated on flat slab doors |
| Matte, satin, semi gloss | Sheen level | Satin is the practical default. Higher sheen cleans more easily but shows every surface imperfection, including any underlying damage |
What affects refinishing price
- Door and drawer count, which matters more than linear footage on this job
- Existing finish type. Stripping a factory conversion varnish takes far longer than scuffing a worn lacquer
- Open grain species. Oak needs grain filling for a smooth painted result
- Color change severity. Dark to light needs more coats and better blocking primer
- Repairs to dents, water damage, or delaminated veneer
- Whether thermofoil is present. Peeling thermofoil generally cannot be refinished and needs new doors
Why cure time matters more in Clovis
Finish chemistry is sensitive to temperature and humidity, and Clovis delivers extremes of both. Spraying in a garage in August, when local highs average close to 100 degrees, can flash solvents out of the film too fast, which traps stress in the coating and causes it to become brittle. In December, tule fog mornings push humidity high enough to slow curing and, on some products, to cloud the film. This is the practical reason we spray doors in a controlled shop environment rather than in your driveway, and why we give you a real cure window instead of telling you the kitchen is ready the same evening. Most modern waterborne cabinet coatings are dry to the touch within hours but continue hardening for several weeks, and cabinets that get scrubbed hard in week one will show it for the life of the finish.
Financing available on cabinetry projects
Most kitchen cabinetry projects land between $8,000 and $40,000. We work with homeowners who would rather spread that over monthly payments than pay in full up front. Ask your estimator to walk you through the options during your free consultation.