Are your Thermofoil cabinets peeling or chipping?

Are your thermofoil cabinets peeling or chipping off? We call this Termofoil Turmoil! If you can relate, and haven't remodeled your cabinetry, the chances are you might be experiencing the dreaded—Thermofoil Turmoil—from peeling, to chipping, to complete delamination. Although chipping and peeling sounds hopeless––there are options––and Woodwork Solutions is here to help! 

What Are Thermofoil Cabinets? 

Thermofoil cabinets are made using a flexible vinyl material that is applied by heating the vinyl and molding it over medium-density fiberboard (MDF) or engineered wood. Thermofoil cabinets can be appealing because of their price point, but they do have some disadvantages. With our recent and extreme moisture in the air, the MDF can swell and the thermofoil can begin to peel away from the surface of the cabinet. 

What Is The Solution To Delamination? 

There are a couple options to consider if you have delamination of thermofoil cabinetry: 

1. You can replace the doors with new thermofoil doors. The benefit of this option is thermofoil cabinetry is less expensive than wood cabinetry. The downside is eventually delamination may reoccur, and there is no easy fix besides replacing the doors—again!  

2. You can replace your thermofoil doors with wood doors that are painted or stained. Although painted and stained wood doors can still experience wear-and-tear, they can easily be refinished to remove cracks, dents, and scratches, without needing to be replaced. The disadvantage of wood doors is the cost, which are more expensive than thermofoil.

What We Recommend 

Woodwork Solutions recommends refacing your cabinet doors with new custom-wood doors. Refacing is a great option if you don’t intend to alter the footprint of your kitchen layout.

Refacing includes installing new moldings to the existing cabinets, painting or faux finishing the cabinets, and installing all new custom-wood doors. New drawers can come with soft-close hardware—and who doesn’t love soft-close drawers! We can make your current-dated kitchen look brand new for far less than installing all new cabinets. 

Thermofiol cabinetry problems and solutions from woodwork solutions

Featured Kitchen

Woodwork Solutions transformed this featured kitchen from floor-to-ceiling! The footprint of the kitchen was not altered; instead, it was modified with all new refaced cabinets. False panels over the drywall soffit were added, which provides a more upscale look. Cabinets were built to the ceiling—making the kitchen feel more grand and providing more storage, while eliminating the unusable, empty space that usually accompanies lower-built cabinets. This kitchen also features soft-close drawers and organizers, a new trash pullout in place of the old trash compactor, and a custom-built hood above the stove. No kitchen is complete without a center island; and this island does not disappoint, as it comes equipped with an extra sink.

Thermofoil kitchen cabinets peeling and chipping problems and solutions by woodwork solutions

Creating dream kitchens is Woodwork Solutions specialty. For more information and a free in-home evaluation, please call our number at 949-459-9663.

Hope to hear from you soon!

The Woodwork Solutions Team


1 comment


  • Deborah Smith

    Morning, put an offer in on a home and noticed the kitchen cabinet doors were peeling and one has creases in it. Need ballpark figure how much to drop asking price to cover repairs. My concern is while the doors are peeling the base of the cabinets are not yet. Read that they have to be peeling to remove the thermafoil. Please enlighten me


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