If you live in the Greater Vancouver area and have a young family, chances are that you live in a condo or townhouse. It takes some creativity to step outside of the builders box and express one’s unique style and personality despite the identical exterior and floor plan you share with dozens of neighbours.
I have long been a fan of houses with colourful front doors like those pictured below. However, not until visiting my interior decorating instructor’s condo and admiring the bright red interior of her door, did I consider such an option for my own home.
I took the leap and chose to paint mine apple green since this is one of the accent colors I have used throughout my home. Honestly, a bit scary, but I love how it adds personality and color to the space. We also added a Dash and Albert runner to brighten up the dark brown floors. And now, I have one area of my home that is officially, 100% done! Okay, I need to touch up the paint around the stairs still, FYI, don’t paint first if you are planning to rip out carpet and replace it with wood, but otherwise I’m perfectly happy with it.
First a before pic:
Not convinced yet? Here are some more gorgeous front doors (in better taken photos!):
The process of painting your door’s interior is quite simple. All you need is a medium grit sanding pad, multi surface primer, paint (I like monamel, a hard working trim paint found at General Paint), a brush, foam roller, painters tape and a paint tray.
Step 1: Sand your door with medium grit sand paper to roughen it up a bit and given the paint something to stick to.
Step 2: Remove the door handle and lock.
Step 3: Wash door with a wet cloth.
Step 4: Use a tack cloth to remove any excess dust or hairs.
Step 5: Tape off the trim surrounding the door as well as any bits of the door you want to leave unpainted.
Step 6: Prime, Wait, and Prime again. I like to use my paintbrush for any small, hard to reach spaces and my foam roller to get an over all smooth finish on larger surface areas.
Step 7: After primer is dry apply your first coat of monamel.
Step 8: Wait 24 hours before applying second coat. (Monamel is a terrific paint and becomes dry to touch in an hour or so but needs 24 hours to cure properly before a second coat. It’s worth the wait, I tried to cheat on another project and it didn’t go well.)
Step 9: Step back, accept that the finish won’t be as perfect as your original sprayed on white, and smile because it still looks awesome.