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EVERYONE ALWAYS SAYS if you want a cheap and cheerful way to update your kitchen, change your hardware. My kitchen cabinets never had hardware to begin with so I knew the impact would be huge.
Gold hardware was the sure-fire answer for me but I hadn’t anticipated how hard to find (and expensive!!!) it would be. Ordering it online wasn’t really an option for this impatient soul and besides, I couldn’t stomach the thought of breaking the bank over such a small detail. Even if the affect would be substantial.
Enter everybody’s favourite, love-to-hate, hate-to-love Swedish store. Oh Ikea - no body does it like you. I ended up finding the Tyda Handles at my local store for 75% and decided that was a price I could get on board with. And because I like to add a little bit of complexity to everything I do – they weren’t ready to go up until they got a nice coat of spray paint.
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If you turn to the interwebs you’ll quickly learn that finding the perfect gold spray paint is no-small task. A lot of selection and with a lot of varying results. Thankfully a bajillion other people have already done the extensive research and Rust-Oleum Metallic always comes out on top. I also bought a clear finishing spray since I knew the handles would be, well, handled a lot. Kind of like with my cabinet paint, I bought a matte finish but and am not 100% convinced that was the right call. A satin/glossy finish might have been nicer.
Anyway. This DIY project was relatively simple but there was one part of it that was extremely intimidating to me. I’ve spray painted enough things in my lifetime I assure you that wasn’t the intimidating part.
My master-measuring parents had left me to my own devices at this point. Somehow I was going to have to mark and drill holes for the hardware making sure it all lined up perfectly. So. Much. Pressure!!!
Because I suck at math and anything related I’ve gotten really creative in the past with creating templates for such projects (see my method for hanging frames up).
So here’s what I did.
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My plan was to install the hardware over the trim part that I had just added to my cabinets in their makeover. This made all the measuring much simpler. I grabbed a spare piece of wood and measured out the middle of the 2″ piece. Then holding the piece up to my actual cabinets (so its was flush on the sides and to the bottom) I marked where on the door I wanted the bottom of the handle to hit. By doing this I was able to line it up easily on each door and know exactly where I had to drill.
I cut a piece of tape and put it over the back of the handle and punched a hole through it where the screws would go. This helped me get the spacing of the two holes just right. Then I taped the piece onto my wood template (centred) and marked the spacing.
Then just to be sure it was all right – I drilled holes into the wood where my marks were and attached the handle to double-triple check it all.
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Once I knew that was all good I was able to just lay the template over the piece of trim, line it up on the sides and top (or bottom) edge. And mark my drill holes. Using the template ensured that all the holes would be lined up on every cabinet.And voila! That’s how I attached my hardware which looks – stellar – if I do say so myself. More pictures to come as I continue to reveal my kitchen reno!
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