RV Kitchen Remodel Ideas
Our camper kitchen used to depress me. Tan laminate counters. A backsplash that was just painted-over wood pretending to be tile. The faucet wobbled. First thing I cooked in there I knocked the salt off the ledge twice because there was no ledge, just a slope.
So I redid it slow. One Saturday at a time, mostly with stuff I printed at the Office Depot on Burnet Road because our home printer chokes on anything bigger than a recipe card. Peel-and-stick where I could. A flag by the step. Little signs that make the four square feet of counter feel decided-on instead of just there.
Everything below is a digital file off an indie design shop, the place I grab designs from when I want something specific and cheap. If you click through and buy I get a few cents, which mostly funds my lamination habit. Here is the galley, drawer by drawer.
The spinner I hung by the galley window instead of a curtain
Our kitchen window faces the picnic table, and I never wanted a curtain there because then I cannot see if a raccoon is going through the cooler again (it happened, in Ouray, last August). So I printed this Drive Slow spinner on the heavy stock, cut it, and strung it on fishing line right in the window frame.
It twists in the breeze while I do dishes. Throws a little spin of color on the counter when the late sun comes through. Cozy in a way I did not expect from something I made at a copy shop.
One nitpick. The cut lines are tight near the lettering, and I rushed it the first time and nicked the D. Take your time on that part. Sharp scissors, not the kitchen ones.
Coffee art for the one shelf above the two-burner
There is exactly one open shelf above my stove and it had a coffee ring burned into it from the previous owner. I was not sanding that out. So I covered it. Printed this mug clipart small, four of them in a row, and stuck them across the shelf face with a strip of clear contact paper over the top so steam does not lift the edges.
Now the first thing I see at 6am is little mugs. Fitting, since coffee is the only reason I am vertical that early.
Nitpick: the art is bright PNG color, real saturated, which looked great on photo paper and a touch loud on plain copy paper. If your galley is already busy, print it at like 70 percent size so it reads as a detail, not a billboard.
A flag for the step where the kitchen spills outside
Half my cooking happens outside the door anyway, on the folding table, so the galley sort of extends to the dirt. I treat the entry step as part of the kitchen. This garden flag went on a little pole right there by the door mat.
It is the camping lady design, kind of retro, and my neighbor at the Moab site asked where I bought the flag. I did not buy a flag. I printed the design on waterproof poster paper and clipped it to a dollar-store flag stand. Told her that and she laughed.
The nitpick is durability. Paper version faded after about three weeks of direct desert sun. If you want it to last a season, take the file to a print shop that does outdoor banner vinyl. Costs a bit more. Worth it for the door.
The little quote print taped over the spice nook
Between my fridge and the wall there is a four-inch gap I crammed a spice rack into. Ugly gap. I printed this Camper Quote on cardstock, trimmed it to a skinny vertical, and taped it on the wall above the spices so your eye goes to the words instead of the chaos of cumin and old taco seasoning.
Simple fix. Took ten minutes including finding the tape.
Nitpick: it is a quote design, so the whole thing lives or dies on the font reading clean. Print it bigger than you think, then trim down. I printed mine too small the first round and the text got mushy on the cheap paper. Second try on cardstock at full size was crisp.
Welcome sign that doubles as a galley window cover
When we park somewhere with neighbors close, I do not love them seeing straight into my sink full of dishes. So this Welcome to Our Campsite flag pulls double duty. Outside hours it is on the little pole by the awning. When I want privacy at the window I clip the same print inside against the glass. Friendly on both sides.
My kid actually picked this one out, said it looked like the camp office sign at the place we went in the Smokies.
Nitpick: it is sized as a garden flag, taller than my window is wide, so I had to trim the bottom border to fit the glass. Lost a little of the design margin. If you only want the window use, print it scaled to your actual pane first, measure twice.
Second spinner over the sink, because one was not enough
Once the Drive Slow spinner worked in the window, I got greedy. Printed this Camping Life spinner too and hung it over the sink from a cup hook in the cabinet bottom. Now there are two of them turning when the door is open and a cross breeze goes through.
They clink the faintest bit against each other sometimes. I like it. Sounds like the camper is awake.
Nitpick, and it is the same one as before: spinners need a real cut and a real curl to spin right. The file gives you the design, not the engineering. I scored mine down the center with a bone folder to get the spiral to actually catch air. First flat one just hung there like a sad ornament.
A sunset scene cut for the cabinet door fronts
The upper cabinet doors in my galley are flat slabs, total blank canvas, and I have a little vinyl cutter that lives under the bench seat. This Sunset Lake Scene is an SVG, so I cut it in matte cream vinyl and laid it across two cabinet doors so the scene reads as one picture when both are shut.
Closed up, my whole upper galley is now a lake at dusk. Open the cabinet and the scene splits, which honestly looks kind of cool too.
Nitpick: the design has fine little tree lines and my cutter ate two of them on the first pass because my blade was dull. Swap your blade before a detailed cut. And weed it slow, the thin branches lift if you yank the transfer tape fast.
The funny flag I hid where only the cook sees it
Not every kitchen thing needs to be tasteful. This Funny Camping flag I printed small and stuck on the inside of the cabinet door right above my prep spot, so the joke faces me while I chop onions and nobody else gets it.
My own private galley graffiti. Makes me snort every time I reach for the cutting board.
Nitpick: it is built as a garden flag, so the punchline sits in the center with a lot of empty border around it. For the cabinet-door trick I cropped way in on just the text and the little graphic. Took two minutes in a free photo app. Out of the box it is sized for a yard, not a cupboard.
Matching the drive-slow theme onto the trash nook curtain
Under my sink the door fell off its hinge in week one (thanks, 2008 build quality), so I gave up and hung a little fabric curtain over the gap to hide the trash bin. I printed this Drive Slow garden flag design onto iron-on transfer and pressed it right onto that curtain.
Now the trash hideaway matches the spinner in the window. Tied the galley together without me buying anything new.
Nitpick: iron-on transfer onto a textured fabric is fussy. My first press did not take in the corners and they peeled after one wash. Press longer than the package says, use a pressing cloth, and do not wash it for a couple days. Let it cure.
Live Love Camp across the backsplash strip
The backsplash was my biggest gripe. Fake-tile painted wood, peeling at one seam. I covered the worst stretch with peel-and-stick subway tile from the hardware store, then printed this Live Love Camp design as a long centered transfer and applied it across the new tile right behind the burners.
That one wall went from embarrassing to the part of the kitchen I photograph. Real difference for under twenty bucks.
Nitpick: heat. It is behind the stove, and the cheap peel-and-stick transfer started to lift at the edge nearest the burner after a hot soup day. I trimmed the design so it sits a few inches off to the side now, out of the direct heat line. Plan around your burner, not over it.
Floral panel for the inside of the pantry door
My pantry is a tall skinny cabinet and the inside of the door was bare particleboard. Every time I opened it for the pasta, sad gray board. So I sized this Camping Queen Floral design to the full door and printed it across three sheets at the copy shop, then taped them edge to edge inside the door.
Now opening the pantry is the prettiest thing in the kitchen. Florals and a camper. My partner calls it my fancy cabinet.
Nitpick: tiling three printed sheets means lining up the seams, and I was off by a hair on the middle one so a flower is slightly split. Nobody notices but me, yet I notice. If you go multi-sheet, print with a little overlap and trim the seams to match before you tape.
Camp Life pressed onto the galley dish towels
Last thing. This Camp Life design is sold as a t-shirt design, but I used it on the dish towels that hang off my oven handle, because matching dish towels somehow make the whole tiny kitchen look intentional. Iron-on transfer onto plain flour-sack towels from the dollar store.
Three towels, one afternoon, a movie in the background. Cheapest upgrade in the whole galley and the one guests comment on most.
Nitpick: it is a shirt design, so it is sized big and bold for a chest. On a small towel that reads fine, but I had to scale it down to about 60 percent or the camper graphic ran off the edge of the towel. Measure your towel, scale to fit, then press.
Frequently Asked Questions
What kind of paint do you use on rv walls?
I learned this one the messy way. The walls in a lot of campers are vinyl-laminated panel, slick stuff, and regular wall paint just slides off and peels. I scuffed mine with fine sandpaper, wiped it down, hit it with a bonding primer (the Zinsser one, the smelly kind), then two coats of cabinet-and-trim enamel because it cures hard and wipes clean.
Do a test patch behind the fridge first. I did, and good thing, because my first primer pick beaded up like water on a duck. The bonding primer was the fix.
Can you paint rv walls?
Yep, you can. People act like it voids some sacred rule and it does not. I painted mine the same winter I fixed the camper and it was the single biggest change for the least money.
The catch is prep, not the painting. Clean, scuff, prime. Skip that and it will peel by the next road trip from all the vibration and temperature swings. The driving really does work paint loose if it is not bonded down right.
Can you put wallpaper on rv walls?
Short answer, yes, and peel-and-stick is the move. I put a strip behind my galley backsplash and it has held through a Texas summer. The textured panel walls are the tricky part because the seams of the panel show through if your paper is thin.
What I do now is run a skim of lightweight spackle over the panel grooves, sand it smooth, then apply. Otherwise you get little lines telegraphing through the paper. Found that out after the first ugly attempt.
Can you paint over rv walls?
You can paint right over the existing wall finish, that is basically what painting an RV wall is, you are going over the factory vinyl panel. Nobody is stripping it to bare wood.
Just treat the existing surface as the slick thing it is. Honestly? The whole secret is the bonding primer. Do that and you can paint over almost whatever the factory put up. I went over my beige panel with a soft sage and it never looked back.
Before You Pack Up
None of this took a contractor or a real budget. A copy shop on Burnet Road, a cheap vinyl cutter under the bench, a box of iron-on transfers, and a lot of Saturdays. The galley went from a place I tolerated to the corner I actually want to stand in at 6am with the coffee.
Start with one thing. The window spinner, maybe, or the towels. Print it, hang it, see how it changes the four square feet. Then you will be like me, eyeing the pantry door, thinking about florals at midnight.
More Camping Ideas We Love
Heads up: some links in this post are affiliate links. If you grab a file we love, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only feature designs we would happily pack on our own trip.
