'I transformed my dreary kitchen for £150 after being quoted £3,000'
A woman has completely transformed her kitchen for £150 after refusing to spend thousands of pounds on a renovation. Natalie Stainthorpe, from Middlesbrough, said she was quoted around £3,000 for a new kitchen - and decided to do the work herself i nstead.
Natalie, a 34-year-old dental nurse, recently moved into a new home but found the kitchen was dark and "barely got any light" due to a home extension. Using TikTok tutorials, she planned to transform the space on a £250 budget - and even managed to come in £100 under her aim.
She told What's The Jam: "I just couldn't stand how dark and gloomy it felt – I wanted a fresh, light space where I'd actually enjoy cooking and spending time with my family. The kitchen before was in good condition, but needed a little bit of TLC and I had a vision for the room.
"We did a rough estimate of how much it would cost to completely replace the kitchen from a family friend and we were looking at quite a lot of money - around £2,000 to £3,000 - which was money we didn't have. I decided that I was going to do a budget-friendly makeover instead.",
Swapping pricey new units for a few tins of paint and rolls of vinyl, Natalie roped in her partner and sister to help freshen up the cupboards, wrap the worktops and breathe new life into the handles. She picked up cupboard paint for under £15 a tin, snapped up bargain vinyl from B&Q and picked up all her decorating bits from B&M to keep costs down.
The makeover took around a month, squeezed in between shifts and weekends, but the results speak for themselves – the once gloomy kitchen now bright, airy and looking brand new. Natalie added: 'Our original budget was £250 – I didn't want to spend more than that, so to come so far under budget was amazing. It was quite a dark room – dark floors, worktops and cupboards and I really wanted to lighten the space up as because of the extension on the back we don't get that much natural light.
"We found the vinyl easy on the straight parts of the worktops, around the sink was a bit fiddly, we watched a few tutorials on YouTube on how to do it around the sink to try and minimise any mistakes. My partner Chris actually did most of the sink area as I ran out of patience with it. We repurposed the handles that were already on the units as to replace 14 handles in matte black was quite expensive.
"We gave them a light sand and then we sprayed them with Rust-Oleum black matte spray paint and then sealed with a matte sealant spray. We got all our painting supplies from B&M to keep the costs down and budget-friendly – they sell such an amazing range of painting and decorating tools to help with projects like this.
"I spent some time researching how to vinyl worktops watching videos on YouTube and TikTok. I also got lots of tips from my friend who has done lots of vinyling to change up her rental home."
Natalie, who documented her journey on TikTok, says the whole project took around three to four weeks to complete as she picked it up on days off and weekends. She said: "It definitely wasn't a quick transformation but that was fine with us, we loved seeing it slowly come together. The hardest part for me was probably the vinyling, simply because it took more brain power than the rest, and a lot of patience - something I'm known to not have a lot of.
"We didn't encounter any mistakes, we just took our time with the project - apart from when I spilt paint on my hob. If I was to start this project again, I wouldn't change anything – I love how we took our time and worked together to get our final look in here. Rome wasn't built in a day and sometimes time and money restrict a quick transformation.
"I'm all for realistic budget makeovers and those take time. The difference it's made is amazing, it's now light and airy, it's really brightened up the room, I'm still obsessed with it now two months down the line. We've had such an amazing reaction to our makeover, my friends and family said it looks like a brand new kitchen and it's had such a good response both on my Instagram and TikTok.
"My advice would be to take your time, it's okay if you don't get a transformation like this done in a day like you can sometimes see on social media. My second piece of advice to make sure the longevity of your makeover is prep, prep, prep. Spend time prepping your units and surfaces for painting, you'll thank yourself later. It just goes to show, you don't always need a big budget – sometimes a bit of patience and a few clever tricks can completely change your home."
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