Update your kitchen with minimal time, money and skill By Deborah Moon
travels the country leading do-it-yourself workshops and training retailers to teach their customers how to use those products to update the look of their home on a budget. Her September workshop at the Ace Hardware in Newberg sold out quickly. But thanks to the regional training class offered the next day, other Oregonian DIYers will be able to learn how to update their kitchen for less than $250. Amy walked me through the kitchen remodel shown in the pictures accompanying this article. This project cost a bit more because she purchased the cabinets – from Habitat for Humanity, which she says provides great value for old kitchen cabinets like these. The cabinets were very utilitarian, dark wood and not desirable, she says, noting that many people no longer want dark cabinets in their kitchen – “They want bright colors.” Amy’s One Step Paint makes that transition easy. All you have to do is clean grease and dirt off the surface, shake the can
Shortly before coming to Oregon to train people to use her refinishing products, DIY maven Amy Howard consulted with a man lamenting that his two kitchens wouldn’t help sell his home. Amy Howard opened up this kitchen by “This could be for a Jewish family,” removing one cabinet (next to window), Amy told him. “This is something painting the cabinets a lighter color with her a lot of people would look for or one step paint and replacing the light fixture. custom build.” When she returns to Memphis, she plans to show him how to use her Amy Howard at Home One Step Paint and other products to update the kitchens to attract buyers when he puts the home on the market later this year. Kitchens are just part of Amy’s story – she also has a fix for old furniture. In 2009 the Environmental Protection Agency reported that furniture is the number one least-recycled item in a household and accounted for 9.8 million tons of household waste. “As we are increasingly persuaded by TV shows to remodel our homes and to replace old furniture, we are also adding more to the landfill in record numbers,” according to a planetsave.com story on the EPA report. Amy says the staggering amount of discarded furniture inspired her to help people rescue their furniture and cabinets instead of taking them to the landfill. “I was an interior designer,” says Amy. “I took the processes I developed in designing and manufacturing furniture and packaged it to rescue furniture.” Last year Amy Howard at Home products went national, and her products are now sold in nearly 2,500 retail locations including all Ace Hardware stores. Now Amy
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