Welcome to the joys of home ownership. I cannot advise you about whether to restore the original surface finish, or redo the white paint job, but I can give you my 2 cents worth on the main question:

DO WE DO IT OURSELVES OR HIRE A PROFESSIONAL...
My reply there is, without question, DO IT YOURSELF.
This is a perfect job for you to tackle as a new homeowner.
It is not structural, it is basically a decorative job. It has technical aspects to it.

But approach a neighbor with a similarly aged home, and very politely strike up a conversation with them. Most owners will be very complimented to be asked what they did with such problems. And, you will get to know your neighbors quicker.

If what you do does not meet your quality control standards, you'll know it with the first room you do. Pick the room least used and least likely to inconvenience you during the repair/refinish process.

But DO IT. If you discover that home repair is not something you are capable of doing, be sure you have deep pockets because this is only the first of many things you will encounter in the coming years. Enjoy .....

How old is the house and the painted woodwork?

Lead Acetate is the most common lead found in paint.
It was used as a gloss improver and drier for a very long time.

If the paint has lead you should remove the trim to make any changes besides putting on a new coat of paint.

You might also price purchasing new molding in the same style and shape.

It is often available and a far easier path than stripping and refinishing, especially if lead paint is involved.

I love natural finished wood. Most folks dream of old houses with all natural woodwork, but ... what alot of people dont realize is that most service rooms, or less formal rooms (like second floor bedrooms) had painted wood trim from the beginning. My house is circa 1900 and all the original trim and doors on the first floor, except the kitchen, were shellac finished quarter-sawn oak. The kitchen was always painted pine trim. All of the trim on the second and third floors were always painted pine while the doors were shellac finished oak, like on the first floor.

You may strip your woodwork, but you may find lesser grade wood under that paint and then your kitchen may end up looking like a lodge with rustic pine trim, rather than the lovely gracious Tudor you desire ...

test some small spots and see what is under the white trim. try some fine sandpaper and sand a small spot - if you find raw wood immediately under the paint, the wood was always painted, if you find a golden or rich brown finish (it may or may not be glossy, depending on how you sanded it) then it probably was finished with shellac (still the preferred finish up till about 1950's for interior woodwork)

Best of luck however you forge ahead !!

Thanks for the responses! I think I'll give it a go in a small space that is less obvious, as suggested. If it turns into a complete project I will post before and after pics as well as any lessons learned.

This is one of many projects I am looking forward to tackling so thanks for the encouragement and introduction to the forum.

Cheers!

We tried to do the same thing in our old house and here is what we found out.
It is cheaper to replace the trim with new that find a professional to strip and refinish the old trim (if you find any willing to do the job). Stripping is time consuming and a nasty job. So, the only way to go is to do it your self. Now how is this trim like? Just plain flat and square or does it have the usual in and out curves? It is very difficult to get all the paint out from the grooves. It can be done but very time consuming and involves nasty chemicals. How many layers of paint is there? You might have lead as suggested, oil, acrylic or latex. Some of them are harder to remove than others.
I also agree with the previous poster about the quality of wood. We spent weeks to completely strip a fireplace mantle (too many grooves) just to find a very plain pine. We ended up staining it as dark as we could to hide the rustic effect. In the end it worked ok but I am still not persuaded it was worth the effort.
I do not want to sound discouraging but this is a lot of trim you are talking about and a very nasty job. I refinish furniture for a hobby and I have to say house trim is way harder.
It might be worth your time to just paint it again. There are a lot more color choices to paint a room when you can also paint the trim.

If you have peeling/chipped woodwork, it still needs to be stripped before it's painted if you want a professional looking finish. The stripping need not be as thorough as when the wood is to be stained, but the old paint needs to come off if there's a deep accumulation. The top finish is never going to look better than what's under it.

As far as replacing old trim with new because it easier - if you rip out the original parts & everything that's worn out in an old house, & replace them with new, you'll wind up with a new house in an old shell. Buying a newer home to begin with would be easier & probably cheaper.

I can appreciate the comments similar to "it is easier and cheaper to replace painted trim with new", posted above. I'm sure that is a true statement. And time is worth money too. However, the quality of the wood available now is not as good as the wood available and utilized in building 50 or 100 years ago. In some wood species the grain available now is not as tight. The long lengths and, in some cases, the wide widths are no longer available. Even pine is not as good quality now as in the old days. I've even seen a big difference in the quality of wood used for 2x4s.

My humble opinion is: to do your very best to rehab the existing wood trim in an old home is a worthy endeavor. Once existing trim is gone, it is gone... and an original feature of an antique home is lost.

I wouldn't get new trim either and I am sorry my post was so discouraging. I just wanted to emphasize what a big job it is to strip so much trim. In my old house we striped the mantle and the brick of the fireplace and three big (multi-panel)windows and we stopped there. Too many grooves filled with latex paint! It was a lot more work than I thought. The moldings were always painted and in the end I made peace with the fact.

I'm a hardened old house owner with many hours of paint stripping work both behind and ahead of me - it is messy and takes a lot of time but even so I too would always strip before repainting. I would recommend you at least try it so you see how it goes. You can't really screw up too badly.

Even if you don't end up liking the wood (and some of our fir is good wood but not really nice graining), it always looks nicer in the end to have one layer of paint than 7 on your trim. Multiple layers loses the profile, not to mention all the divots and drips that inevitably exist after multiple coats.

Spin around this forum a bit for information on which strippers to use.

By the way Brickeeye, OP says the house is mid-thirties.

KarinL

A mid-thirties house is very likely to contain lead paint if it was painted in that period.

You can have it tested in place or remove a sample of the paint (all layers) and send it to a lab.

The lead paint is not a real hazard if buried under other solid paint layers, but removing it will result in a lot of contaminated waste and should be done outside the house.