Blue kitchens

I've been thinking about doing something for a while now....

I'm giving very serious thought to painting my kitchen cabinets dark blue.

Probably just the lower cabinets, but because my kitchen walls are blue now, a whole bunch of things will need to change - new wall color, accessories, hardware, etc. The cabinets are melamine and we're not going to be replacing them any time soon (major bummer), so painting them will be uncharted territory for me. Have any of you ever done a similar job yourself? Any tips or tricks?

As for color, I love the idea of a really dark, mysterious blue. Old-world blue...A deep navy with sapphire undertones.... I really hope that finding the right color will be the hardest part! I love the idea of doing this with brass hardware, but we just replaced our faucet 6 months ago and I fear it's set the stage for brushed nickel (I know, I know...multiple metals can look great in the same room. I'll get there...).

What do you think? Do any of you know of a great colour that I might check out? I'm itching to do this, so I'm hoping to get started pretty soon (that's code for 'hopefully sometime before 2014!).


Images: one/two/three/four/five