Are you sick of your ugly kitchen counters? Wishing you could upgrade to granite or marble, but you just don’t have the budget for that? Are you stuck at home in quarantine and need a little project to do? We’ve got 4 steps to get new kitchen counters in one weekend with a Giani Countertop Paint Kit!
Step 1: Get Frustrated With An Ugly Kitchen
There it is. My ugly, dated kitchen that was in serious need of a makeover. I did the best I could with what the previous owners left behind (ie. that ugly checkered wallpaper backsplash.) After about 4 years of that, I knew it was time for a change.
I really wanted to paint my cabinets but more than that, I wanted to get rid of the RED COUNTERS. Seriously, who looked at all the options and picked RED… on purpose… with all the other options available to them?! I mean, what, was it like, “Free appliances for your home if you pick the red counters!”
It was my least favorite part of the house when we bought it and I just couldn’t take them another second.
Buying new counters wasn’t in our budget so I was really excited when I heard you could actually PAINT your counters with Giani Countertop Paint Kits!
Step 2: Pick A Color! Any color! (not red)
I selected the Giani White Diamond Countertop Paint Kit, which back in 2015 came with slightly different colors and had instructions for making it look like marble.
They now have a Marble Countertop Paint Kit so you can transform your counters to look like Carrara marble “without the mess, time, or cost.”
Step 3: Go One Layer At A Time
First I painted all my builder-grade oak front cabinets with Nuvo Cabinet Makeover Kit in Titanium Infusion, an ultra bright white that brightened the whole room up! It only took me a couple of days to do it and the results were phenomenal.
Now it was time to tackle the counters!
After reading the instructions and watching the tutorial videos, I have to admit I was a little intimidated. I wasn’t an art major and although I like to think I’m artistic and have painted tons of walls, houses, doors, and even barns in my life, painting countertops scared me a little. “What if I mess up? What if they don’t look good? What if I ruin my counters and can’t get the paint off?!!!” I had so many thoughts swirling through my head once I opened the kit. I finally convinced myself nothing could possibly be worse than red counters and opened the first can of paint. It was black. I put down the first stroke and got nervous, but as I covered up that hideous red, I felt more and more confident that this was a good choice.
Honestly, I might have been happy just with the solid black and a nice glossy top coat, but decided to press on. Next came the hard part… sponging on the individual colors and layering them just right so that it creates that “granite look”.
It was more than a “weekend project” for me since I had 3 kids I still had to take care of while I was painting. Many meals were carefully made while avoiding the counters that were drying in between layers of paint. (I recommend getting takeout or cooking on the grill during a project like this!)
We removed the ugly checkered wallpaper back splash and put up bead board wainscot panel throughout the kitchen. We also used those peel and stick subway tiles behind the stove!
The Amazing transformation
Here is a progression of the layers from start to finish which took me about 5 days. The final picture (far right) is with the high gloss protective top coat.
Step 4: Be Amazed…
The transformation was amazing and well worth the effort in my opinion. Wouldn’t you agree?
Before After
I’m confident I could have done a better job with the Giani countertop paint kit if I had more time and fewer interruptions, but overall I am happy with the outcome. As I said, anything other than red was an improvement. I would have had to do a really horrible job to not be happy with the overall results. That said, I was surprised how easy the process actually was and how good the instructions were.
Before
Before we bought the house… The previous owner’s kitchen style was horrible!
After
I was able to achieve that modern farmhouse kitchen look I was going for. It’s still a work in progress
While I’m not pleased with my wall paint colors, especially because it photographs so horribly. It looked great when I first selected it “fresh melon”. I even liked it for a while after painted almost every room in the downstairs with it. Then once I started taking pictures, I realized it was a terrible choice. Depending on the lighting and the time of day, the darn walls look like a completely different color. Mistakes were made. Next time I have “free time” (lol what’s that?) I will absolutely be changing my wall color to an off white linen beige color of some sort. No. More. Melon.
Meanwhile…. the counters have held up amazingly well for the past 5 years. Yes, I painted them with the Giani Countertop Paint Kit in 2015. I have had to strip a small area where they are used the most and repaint them. The main work area where meals are prepped daily, the edge of the counter where people sit, both sides of the stove, and the area around the sink all started showing signs of wear and the red counters started showing through in various spots. It took 3 years for them to need touch ups though. Take into consideration, we had TWO additional children during that time AND another family stayed with us temporarily so there were 7-10 people putting wear and tear on the counters from 2015-2020.
I touched them up in 2018 and re-did a 1′ x 6′ area and completely redid around the sink in the Winter of 2019. Surprisingly, 90% of the counters are still perfect, look great, and have not needed any touch-ups.
For a large family and a kitchen that is used 3X times a day with lots of children, I’m really impressed at how long they have lasted and how well the paint has held up. For a husband and wife or smaller family, I could see the paint job lasting more than 5 years without needing touch ups.
I waited 5 years to write this review because I wanted to see how well it lasted before making a recommendation. I can now whole-heartedly endorse this product as an excellent solution to ugly counters!
Being a mom of 5, getting the biggest bang for my buck without sacrificing quality is always a top priority for me. The Giani Countertop Paint Kit
in White Diamond was not only affordable, but it was also really easy to do!
Best of all, the results are fantastic!
Overall, I would HIGHLY recommend Giani Countertop Paint Kits to anyone who is looking for an affordable solution to update their kitchen counters and stay on budget. It’s easy, much cheaper than getting new counters, better than any peel and stick contact paper solution, and makes a huge difference in just a few days! You’ve got nothing to lose but your ugly counters and a weekend. Give it a try!
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