House Tour: A Painted Door
You know how you see all those houses on Instagram or Pinterest with these amazing built-ins or cool architectural details?
That is not our house.
Our house is basically the DEFINITION of a cookie-cutter suburban home.
Shortly after we moved in, Bart described our house as two boxes set on top of each other. Ta-da.
That’s our house.
So I’m always on the lookout for things we can do to give our house a little more personality.
A few months ago, I was up before the rest of the family (thank you, pregnancy) browsing through Instagram, and I stumbled on this photo from This Little Street and was immediately obsessed with the yellow door:
I’d actually pinned lots of colored doors over the years, but I’d never particularly considered actually doing it or thought about where it might work in our home. But suddenly I was convinced that this was the perfect solution for our bland (and fairly dinged-up) back door in our family room.
As soon as Bart woke up, I showed him the photo and said, “I think we need to paint our back door.”
(Gee, you can’t imagine why I thought it could use some color or change of any kind. . .).
He told me he’d be amenable and asked me to put together a pin board of examples, since we knew we didn’t want to go yellow.
An hour later, I’d collected about 30 examples of painted interior doors and we’d decided to do the same deep blue as our bedroom wall (it’s Naval from Sherwin-Williams).
I did some quick research about painting metal doors and discovered that SnapDry paint was what you used for this kind of project. The instructions didn’t seem very hard, and on a Saturday morning, we removed the hardware, cleaned off the door, did about thirty seconds of light sanding on each side, and went to town with the paint brushes (I used a regular paint brush to do the trim and Bart used this mini-roller to do the majority of the door).
Sherwin-Williams contributed the paint for this project at no charge and we requested a gallon (I didn’t even think of asking for a different size), but when we picked it up at the store in Naval, they didn’t have a gallon size, so they gave us four quarts instead.
We used probably a third (well under half) of a single quart and that included doing three coats on both sides of the door (if you’re doing a lighter color, you likely won’t need as many coats), so a gallon was WAY overkill.
Now I’m trying to figure out how many more doors I can paint navy blue with all the paint we have left over.
It’s made the BIGGEST difference in that room, which was super bland before, and has really added a nice focal point to the room, plus the navy doesn’t get nearly as filthy as the cream paint before did. You can see straight through to this door from the front door, so it’s seriously improved the view from the front door.
Our backyard is nothing to write home about, but it looks a whole lot better framed in this gorgeous navy color. And our back patio, which is in serious need of some love, looks a thousand times better with the door painted on the outside too.
Anyway, it was a super quick project, didn’t cost a fortune, and made the biggest difference in our house. Just the kind of Saturday morning project I live for.
Yesterday I painted our door to the garage black, and I love it!! It was always getting dirty and little fingerprints. Maybe you have a similar door that needs to be navy.
I love that door! I also love your beautiful wood coffee table. Would you mind sharing where you found it?
Yes! It's from Hayneedle (and a really good price): http://www.hayneedle.com/product/emeraldhomechandlercocktailtable.cfm
Thanks so much!
I love that color! Definitely keeping this in mind for our new house… You're right, it creates a focal point for the room.
That was a perfect color choice and looks great! I want to give Sherwin Williams a shout out. They donated all of the paint for my sons Eagle Scout Project!
My mom went to clean their front door one day and 20 minutes later had the paint supplies out! I get it!
a little work that makes a HUGE difference! beautiful!
Looks much better. And I've been curious to see how you filled those new shelves. Filling up shelves in a good way is hard!
What a difference that color makes! Great idea.
Navy is my favorite color – I love this! What a difference!
Janssen! Oh my goodness this looks amazing ! Don't tell ANYONE it was your completely original idea, you will have your own TV show in seconds!
Seriously – love it!
xx Lori
I love the shelves to the left of your door. Would you please share how you made them?
Goodness, what a difference a bit of colour makes to a room? I wish I could paint my door …my landlord enjoys horrid hues of beige!!!
Gasp! You took out the rock?! You guys are do-ers! This is perfect inspiration for our new house. My kind of project, that I would actually follow through with. Looks awesome!
Oh I love this!!! Looks great. And I love the shelves too. I am really enjoying your home tour posts. Thanks for sharing.
PS, enjoy AZ! Right now is when it gets really beautiful. Unless you're dreaming of a white Christmas.
We painted the inside of our front door a bright teal! Our wall color in most of the house is a very pale grey, but that pop of a door makes me so happy every time I see it. Great choice with the navy! Could you do a post or blurb on the shelves? (Or did I miss it?) I love them- especially that hardware.
I am 100% copy-catting this idea, color and all. Like, I'm doing this next weekend because I *LOVE* it so much!
xox
Superb transformation!!!
This is all so impressive! I love the colors you used to decorate front doors. On the Door with green wreath looks beautiful.
Have a very Merry Christmas!
I love this idea! Could you point me to where I’m able to pin this post from your site??