Furniture re-dos Makeovers Tips and tutorials

Furniture repair: sliding doors

I came across a small cabinet that was missing a door. Don’t be afraid to take on a furniture repair. In this post, I will show you how I easily crafted a new door and gave a little cabinet a full makeover.

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mid century cabinet in need of repair. Missing one sliding door
mid century cabinet in need of repair. Missing one sliding door

The first thing I did was take out the one door that was still present. It was good and stuck and really didn’t slide easily at all.

front side of door from cabinet removed

When I flipped it over, I noticed it looked much easier to duplicate on this side and realized this might not be as tricky as I thought.

back side of door from cabinet removed

The first thing I did was sand off the drips of old varnish that were getting in the way of the sliding. I gave it a good scuff sanding all over too so the varnish would have some “tooth” for the paint to stick to.

bottom of cabinet door after sanding away clumps of polyurethane causing it to stick in the track

I had several pieces of leftover faux shiplap pieces from the half bath refresh. They were the perfect size too! I used pieces of lattice moulding cut to size on both the front and back to create a frame. Then glue and a brad nailer to attach it all together.

"new" door made from leftover scraps of 1/4 plywood shiplap and 1x2s on each end routed to hold the wood pieces.

Laying them next to each other, you could see they’d be a great match when painted.

old door on left and new door on right.

I fit them in the cabinet just to make sure everything went together well

both doors placed in cabinet to make sure they fit.

I gave the “new” door a coat of stain so once distressed back, the undercoat would be similar in color. It really doesn’t have to be exact, just pretty close.

new door with base stain to be close to old color

Oil based varnish and water based paints don’t always play well together. The last thing I wanted was the new paint job sliding off when I went to distress the cabinet. Dragging the whole piece out to the yard and using a spray paint primer solved that problem. Taking it apart made it easier to paint without missing any spots.

cabinet in pieces on ground after spray paint primer.

I noticed when I removed the back, it wasn’t incredibly secure so I put an extra piece of lattice across the back to help keep everything in place a little better.

rear of cabinet after adding lattice board to secure back to when reattaching.

The top needed something more interesting than just paint.

top of primed cabinet with old stain on it waiting for new top.

Attaching a new top was pretty simple. Glue and screws from underneath will keep it from moving around while the glue dries.

top of cabinet with glue all over it to secure new top.

I used other pieces of the shiplap placed on a piece of 1/2″ plywood and then edge banded to look like one solid piece to create a top.

new top in place on cabinet after glueing and screwing.

Once the glue was dry, I painted the whole cabinet Shabby Paints Alamo White and gave the top a base coat of Vanilla Bear.

base coat of light wood toned paint

Then I used Hazelnut ReVax to create the first layer for a faux wood look.

Then I distressed the cabinet and doors and slid the new doors into place. This furniture repair was coming along nicely.

cabinet with second coat of stain added on top

I added some cup pulls to the drawer front to update the look a bit.

drawer of cabinet with new bin pulls

Gave a final top coat of Black ReVAX for depth and the new cabinet was ready for it’s new home!

full view of finished cabinet with furniture repair made. sliding door added

Do you feel like you could take on a furniture repair like this? Need any help with a project? I’m happy to provide tips or advice if you need some.

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pinnable image that leads back to furniture repair sliding door post.

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