Bleach.

https://www.rockler.com/how-to/bleach-walnut-wood-lighter-lye-peroxide-ab-bleach/

You do realize this is going to be a huge project, don't you? Every single bit of finish has to be removed so the bleach will evenly penetrate. Then you need to hope that with your particular cabinets and situation the bleach will do what it is supposed to do so you'll end up with the result you are hoping to get. Then, you need to reapply a good, even finish that will hold up well.

This piece of advice is coming from someone who stripped a complete kitchen full of cabinets and then stained and refinished them. I ended up with what I wanted, but it was endless hours of work. I wouldn't go into this lightly (pun intended).

Are you asking about walnut you already have that you want to make lighter? Or are you planning to install a kitchen with those shades of wood? If the latter, I would not get walnut in the first place. I'd get oak and ceruse it or bleach it.

Gee, in that pic they took the gorgeous tones of walnut - the thing that makes it so prized, and so expensive - and stripped it. A crime, a travesty to do that to that precious wood.

Edited to add: I just looked up the kitchen - the designers call it their "driftwood kitchen". Makes me want to cry that they make the glorious walnut wood look like driftwood.

i am wanting to refinish my current walnut caninets. Over the last 12 years they have develp an orange cast, which i understand is what walnut does. They do not pair well with the rest of our updated house, especially the floors. i am just trying see what my options are and actually really love the look of the ”driftwood”, crime or not. Definitely open for opinions on other ways to update them!

Walnut lightens normally. Put a sun lamp in the kitchen and leave them alone. Stripping walnut veneer to refinish like you want is a 2 year project. But you’ll burn through the veneer in multiple spots before you figure out that you should have just not started the project.

Drop 50-80K on new custom walnut cabinets if you want that look. But it won’t be in style long enough to do that, and then drop another 50K on the stained green cabinets that are the fad after that.

Natural real walnut will never go out of style. Change the rest if the non classic fad finishes to go with it. Not the other way around.

Thanks. They are actually solid walnut, no venee. Do you know how to get a non-orange, natural looking walnut?

Can you please provide photos so we can see what you are talking about? It would be helpful in advising you of various solutions. Bleaching walnut is a huge task that should be done in the shop not onsite. Done onsite, you may end up appalled at the results. Walnut does tend to change color over time, but typically not to an ”orange cast” you described. So please let us see better what they look like and what can be done.

Edited for added photo: Here is typical color change for walnut, lighter as @User and @User mentioned.

Those are beautiful and need no changes whatsoever. Classic and gorgeous. Not do much the floors you’re trying out there. Which clash. A d would clash worse with bleached wood cabinets.

But to get the current fad bleached wood, will require chemically stripping the existing coating. A month or so of that, or a week full time. Cabinet finishes finishes are super tough. Most people never get past this step. It’s just too much like real work.

Then you very carefully sand off 1/64 of the surface. Without rounding over and ruining the profile, or creating deep scratches.

Then apply applying a dangerous chemical mix with a respirator, heavy nitrile gloves, with all everything metal moved out if the kitchen and it sealed off with an industrial explosion proof blower for ventilation.

Do that twice.

Then neutralize.

Then resand, because you’ll have raised the grain.

Then replace the drawer glides, because they will be corroded from the chemical fumes. Which is why you really have to be concerned with sealing off all of your electrical and plumbing like you’re shrink wrapping up a hairbrush that you never get out of the packaging.

Then use an airless sprayer like a Graco X19 to apply a clear non yellowing waterborne finish like Renner 851 in a 5-25 sheen, depending on if you want dead matte or subtle satin.

Not kidding that its 2 years of work (and snkut 2K in materials) and by the time it’s done, the fad is past. Whereas what you have was great in 1951, 1981, and 2021. It will never be out of style.

Those cabinets are lovely. You don’t show the rest of your kitchen, but I am wondering whether the problem is the lighting and/or the counters and/or the backsplash. That happens a lot on this forum - people come on here unhappy with their cabinets, but when we see the photos, it is clear that the counters, backsplash, lighting, and/or wall paint color are the real issues, but the homeowners are so used to them they don’t realize and assume it‘s the cabinets because the cabinets take up a lot of visual space

I don't know if someone actually answered your question about the color...but it isn't the wood that changes color- it is the polyurethane finish. Old poly "ambers" with age. Strip it, sand it, get it off and then use a water based urethane to finish it without the amber tones.

And, back in the day we called this "driftwood" finish "pickling". It was all the rage!

@The Wood Mill - “pickling” yes! Brings me back…I moved into a home in the mid-90s that the previous homeowners had pickled the oak floors. It was “The Thing” to do in the late ’80s/early ’90s. Sort of akin to the recent fad of grayed stripey wood floors that started about 5-7 years ago and is mercifully over. In that ’90s home the first thing I did was strip the pickled floors and bring them back to clear oak.

I understand your advice to the OP to strip her cabinets, sand them, and then urethane, but I think it‘s an enormous job that she may not understand the difficulty of. Also, that will not get her the driftwood look she wants (and I hope she comes to realize the driftwood will look bad and she would regret it).

So, after considering all of your comments, I have decided not to go with the ”driftwood” look and stay with natural walnut. They will still have have to be sanded completely down. I have hired a professional painter who is coming next week to discuss what i want. I am hoping to acheive the look in the picture below. do you fee this is possible? Is it still an enormous job even for a professional?

That is NOT a job for a “painter”. You need a cabinet finishing professional. They would only be willing to do that on a time and materials basis. Figure north of 12-15K to start with, as you’d still do 70% of the refinishing list above. Its a huge time suck, that most dont want to deal with when they can spend 45 hours painting a kitchen for 6-8K.