Refrigerator Up Do

Hi Everyone.

I am going to show you how I am starting to up date builder stock appliances when you do not have new appliances in your budget.

Until Terry finds a new job we are on a very tight budget so the builder stock appliances in this town house will have to stay for awhile.  

I thought with very little funds, some creative decor crazy and Terry and his tools,  maybe we could make these appliances look nice and more up to date.

This post is going to be about the Refrigerator Up Do!!!

Remember my post on re purposing Terry's grandmothers cabinet to the empty open space above the refrigerator.
You can see that post here.  I wanted the refrigerator to blend more with the above cabinet.

The refrigerator is just a simple side by side refrigerator.  Nothing  fancy about it.  We actually bought this when we moved in.  The  refrigerator left here was not working and I did not have a budget for all new appliances.  We just wanted to get something simple and white to match the other white appliances.  

We went to the Sears Outlet and found this Kenmore.  I have never been to a Sears Outlet before and a friend told me she got some great deals on nice appliances there.  This Kenmore premium side by side was originally $1800 marked down to $1100 and the day we went in they had an additional 50% off.  So that refrigerator was $550 out the door.  So if you need a temporary fix or top of the line appliances for not a lot of money.  Check out the outlet if you have one near you. They carry all brands from top of the line on down.  

 They are marked down sometimes just because of a ding or dent.  This one had a dent on the side but it is up against the cabinet so you do not see it.  This also came with all the warranties since it is a new appliance and never used.   It is hit or miss at these outlets but sometimes you can really score.  So this refrigerator will be good until we can budget for new appliance down the road.

So we began this refrigerator make over with taking off the handles.

We found this very inexpensive trim at Home Depot.  

Here is the trim put on the original handles.  Terry wet the trim and then attached and molded it to the handles.  Pretty clever.  Now I could use the original handles and just dress them up a little bit.

Now even with the refrigerator having a cabinet feel and the new trim pieces it still felt ho hum to me.  

Yep!  It needs something on that long door to feel finished and tie into the cabinet above.  So........

Added a  trimmed out chalk board.

So the refrigerator has trim and a new chalk board to give a little character.  So for less than $30 I have given the refrigerator a little face lift.  After looking at this refrigerator for a little bit I still felt it needed the trim to stand out more!
Yep! I got the eye roll from Terry when I said that out loud!!!

So we brushed on the ebony stain and then wiped it with a cloth to give a vintage gray effect to the trim and door

So now the refrigerator has a little more gray in it that brings out the trim and off sets the refrigerator from the light gray walls.

We had enough trim pieces to trim out the pantry door too.

Adding a little bit of inexpensive trim to the stock pantry doors just took it up a notch.  It gives a more finished look to boring flat white doors.  

I decided the pantry door too did not stand out on it's own with the new painted trim.  So out came the stain and after we stained it and rubbed it out we added a white wash treatment

This is an up close picture of the pantry door.  You can see the texture the stain gave to the white paint. 

I did the same stain treatment to the pantry door and trim as the refrigerator.  Again good pictures during a cloudy day are a challenge.  Sorry this looks a little washed out.

Now I am on a roll.  Next challenge the dishwasher.

Hope you have a great start to the new week.  Our temps here in Illinois have dropped to the 70's.  Just beautiful open the windows weather now.  I know fall is on its way.

Kris

:)