Hollywood Refinishing does kitchen cabinet refinishing and refacing in Beverly Hills, California — 90210, 90211 and 90212, from the hillside streets above Sunset down through the Flats to the apartment blocks off Olympic. Our shop is on Sherman Way in North Hollywood, over Coldwater Canyon.
Two things make cabinet work here different from a Valley job, and neither is that the houses are expensive. The first is that many of these kitchens were built in place in the 1920s and 30s, to openings no modern cabinet line drops into — pull one out and you have also bought a tile backsplash that ends exactly where the old upper ended. The second is the clock. Municipal code 5-1-205 bars permit-requiring construction between 6:00 P.M. and 8:00 A.M. on any day, at any time on a Sunday, and — inside a residential zone or within five hundred feet of one — at any time on a Saturday. That single rule shapes the schedule of every job in this city, and it is why the same kitchen takes longer here than it does eight miles north.
Licensed California contractor, CSLB #818749. Call (818) 988-4240 or use the contact page to arrange a walkthrough.
Pull a 1930s Beverly Hills kitchen out and you are not simply buying new boxes. You are buying non-standard openings stock cabinetry does not land in, a tile backsplash terminating exactly where the old upper ended, and face-frame joinery at a grade that is hard to buy today. Demolition is the cheap part.
Cabinet refinishing keeps the existing boxes and doors: strip or scuff the old coating, repair the damage, re-stain or spray a new finish. Cabinet refacing goes further — new doors and drawer fronts, veneer over the existing face frames — and is right when the doors are past saving but the carcasses are sound. If the boxes are failing at every screw, a new finish is money on a bad foundation, and we say so on the walkthrough.
The Flats and north of Santa Monica. Wilbur Cook Jr. laid out the street plan in 1906 and 1907, and Crescent, Canon, Beverly and Rodeo Drives were opened between Wilshire and Sunset once it was done. The 1920s and 30s houses that followed are Spanish Colonial Revival, English and Tudor Revival, American Colonial Revival and French Eclectic, and their kitchens have usually been remodeled twice already — original fir or gum under later coats. Landmarks here include Wallace Neff’s 1927 McGilvray House on North Alpine Drive and the Greene and Greene Anthony-Kerry House on North Bedford Drive; under municipal code 10-3-3223 an owner or selling agent must tell a buyer when a property is a landmark, in a historic district, on the local inventory, or designed by someone on the city’s list of local master architects.
Trousdale Estates. Paul Trousdale bought 410 acres of the old Doheny estate in 1954 and had it annexed into the city, with Allen Siple as supervising architect; the neighborhood filled in through the 1950s and 60s. What survives is flat-slab walnut and teak, minimal hardware. Slab doors are the best refinishing candidates in this city — no profiles to mask, nothing but grain — and the easiest to wreck, because the wrong topcoat sheen turns a quiet walnut kitchen into something that looks laminated.
South of Wilshire. The city’s 2004 historic resources survey covered 622 multi-family residences built before 1961 south of Wilshire and flagged five potential historic districts holding 268 contributing buildings. The largest, the Tract 7710 district, holds 114 contributors developed primarily in the 1930s, between Wilshire and Olympic from Moreno Drive west to South Rodeo Drive; the Olympic Boulevard district adds 52 more, between South Rexford Drive and Shirley Place. For an owner turning one of those units over, refinishing beats waiting on a cabinet order.
We start with a walkthrough and a finish match — a sample door done in your actual light, not a chip off a fan deck. Doors go to our North Hollywood shop to be sprayed; boxes and face frames are degreased, scuff-sanded, primed and topcoated in place.
Two local rules shape the schedule. Municipal code 5-1-205 bars construction, maintenance or repair work requiring a city permit between 6:00 P.M. and 8:00 A.M. any day, at any time on a Sunday, and on six named public holidays; inside a residential zone or within five hundred feet of one, it is barred at any time on a Saturday. Both lift only with an after-hours permit from the city building official, and the same section bars anyone employed on that work from entering the site before 8:00 A.M. Section 5-1-202 separately caps machinery noise at five decibels above ambient at the property line, which matters for a compressor on a narrow lot. Whether your job needs a permit at all is a question for the City of Beverly Hills Community Development Department at 455 N. Rexford Drive — confirm that with them.
Access is the other constraint. That survey describes the pre-war stock south of Wilshire as sharing rear service alleys, with detached garages or carports reached from the alley, on lots of roughly fifty or sixty feet. The alley is where the van goes; in the Flats and on the hillside streets we stage inside the garage, because often there is nowhere else.
Given how much of this city’s housing predates 1940, we treat coatings in any pre-1978 home as suspect until tested, and we do not dry-sand unknown paint. On mid-century slab doors the veneer is often thin enough that one hard pass at an edge goes through, so those get a light scuff and a toner. The most common find is the sink base — swollen particleboard, a delaminated bottom, soft framing into the toe kick from a supply line that wept for years; where damage has gone past the cabinet we handle the water damage restoration first.
Bathrooms here have the kitchen’s problem: original cast-iron tubs and full-height glazed tile in 1930s colors nobody manufactures now. Tearing out an intact tiled bathroom in a Tract 7710 fourplex means plaster back to the studs. Our bathtub, tile and shower reglazing resurfaces both in place instead.
The rest usually comes up on the same visit. Worn countertops can be refinished alongside the cabinets, original oak strip floors are a job for hardwood floor refinishing, and paneled libraries, bar cabinetry and antique pieces fall under wood and furniture refinishing. If the room needs more than a finish, we do full kitchen refinishing and remodeling — see all services.
Hollywood Refinishing is a licensed California contractor, CSLB #818749, working out of 13151 Sherman Way, Unit G-H, North Hollywood. Refinishing is the whole business, not a sideline — cabinets, bathtubs, tile, floors, countertops and furniture. We are 4.9-star rated on Yelp and 5.0 on Google, every estimate is free and on site, and we will tell you when a surface is past refinishing rather than sell you a finish that will not hold.
Generally the opposite. Original face-frame cabinetry in a 1920s or 30s Beverly Hills house is period fabric a stock replacement cannot reproduce, and refinishing keeps it. If the house is a landmark, in a historic district, or on the local inventory, municipal code 10-3-3223 puts a disclosure duty on the owner or selling agent at sale — confirm your property's status with the City of Beverly Hills Community Development Department at 455 N. Rexford Drive.
Usually, and we prove it first. Those slab doors are veneer with strong horizontal grain, so the match is about toner and sheen rather than pigment — an opaque stain buries exactly what makes them worth keeping. We finish a sample door, hang it on the run in your own light, and adjust.
Good fit for this method. The 1930s buildings in the Tract 7710 and Olympic Boulevard districts have sound original boxes, and refinishing avoids the demolition a replacement forces where plaster and tile are original. We work off the rear alley, spray doors off-site, and keep wet work inside the one unit.
Judge the doors and the boxes separately. Solid-wood doors that are dull, yellowed or over-painted but structurally sound: refinish. Boxes square and solid but doors delaminating, warped, or thermofoil peeling off MDF: reface. Boxes themselves failing at the fasteners: neither, and we will tell you.
Free, on-site estimates across Beverly Hills and the wider Los Angeles area.
Hollywood Refinishing is your trusted remodeling partner ready to help you create a unique and impeccable home!
13151 Sherman Way Unit G-H North Hollywood, CA 91605
818-988-4240