Hi, I once had to strip a 12ft tall oak mantel/overmantel. It had the works in terms of carving and trim, including dentils. I carefully removed the strip of moulding that had the dentils cut into it, and immersed it in a trough (a section of half-round gutter works well for this) of stripper 'til the sides of the dentils were clean. I was able to use a sharpened putty knife to clean up those end-grain edges pretty well. Then the mldg can be sanded before being reinstalled. If the wood is stained with a dark un-removable deep red color, it probably isn't cherry, but birch stained to resemble mahogany. This was terribly popular in the first couple of decades of the last century for architectural woodwork. The stain is an aniline dye, and will bleed through some kinds (many kinds) of paint. An antidote if you want to tone down the red is to overlay a coat of a greenish stain; minwax black walnut stain is good for this. The end result is a warm deep brown. Casey

Do you have any photos you can share? Pictures really help us. What you have sounds pretty neutral and sounds like you have a lot of options. What colors do you have in your family room?

I wholeheartedly agree that if you want to paint your cherry cabinets, go for it! The "however's" are being put forth so you know what you might be getting into. Earlier this year, we contemplated having our maple cabinets painted as opposed to purchasing all new cabinets. Three different companies (from painters to remodelers to cabinet refinishers) provided on-site estimates. In every instance, we were told that for the time and effort it would take to do a proper job, expense-wise we were very close to the cost of purchasing new cabinets. I sensed hesitancy from all of them (reminds me of the resistance your GC gave you), so I wonder if this wasn't their collective way of saying either: 1) Given the time they'd have to devote to this job, they wouldn't make much money off the project, or 2) They didn't feel confident they could provide the near-factory finish (read: durable) results I was seeking. Telling me how expensive it would be might've been their way of steering me clear of having cabinets painted with less than satisfactory results (which would have made them look bad). My concern is that your GC is balking and basically saying, "We'll do it how you want us to do it." Therefore, if results are less than optimal, it's all on you. He's absolving himself of the responsibility if anything goes south -- and there's so much room for interpretation regarding what 'south' is. Is it possible for him to do a test piece, esp if you're up for a two-tone kitchen (per Amber's pic)? Good luck!

Hickory's pretty to me, too (though I can totally see some people thinking it's too busy). Matching--I'd've said there's so much variation in that wood to begin with that you wouldn't need to worry THAT much about matching issues. Try to get the sheen the same, I suppose? Not sure that something where you just have a new extension of the base cabs painted would look that good, though mixed cabinetry works in many circumstances--I just can't picture what your details are! And ditto the others on knowing what you are getting into--I've stripped things other than cabinets, it's way more time consuming than TV makes it look, that's for sure!