‘Are you going to do it red again? Red is the most common colour of front door, you know’
‘I’m not telling you. You’ll see soon enough’
‘I bet it’s going to be one of those bluey-greens. Or orange. Is that orange?’
My neighbour interrogated me. Over the course of the week I had sanded down the paintwork of the front door and we had added a rain deflector to the bottom of the front door. Understandably, it was looking a lot worse than before I started
Various paint testers with their numbers scribbled alongside had remained for over a year because I just couldn’t decide. Eventually I found inspiration from a house we pass on the way home from work each day. It was quite a departure for me
That Sunday was hot. Really hot. By nine that morning the door was off and placed on the workbench in the garage for priming. I hadn’t accounted for the cotton candy seed which was floating thickly in the air that day, so Baz had to close the garage door on me while I worked, to try and keep it from sticking to the paint. This created almost perfect paint oven conditions, but made me feel hot and claustrophobic. Nonetheless, I soon achieved the zen-like state that can only be reached when you like your choice of finish – in this case, Mylands ‘Bond Street’ in a dead flat finish. It looks restrained, contemporary and very posh
1930s houses with original features are sadly in decline, with people taking practical decisions which involve PVCU doors and windows. Never one to follow the herd, when C was small I bought an ‘eyebrow’ door for the house. It was too big and the orientation was wrong for the house, so Baz thought I’d really screwed up, but a carpenter trimmed and hung it for me. Unfortunately the wood was not in great condition, so I filled and sanded as best I could in situ and painted it (badly) in bright red
I didn’t care what Baz thought. It made me smile
So, a decade or so later it deserved a re-visit. Front doors have to withstand constant to-ing and fro-ing, and are the first line of defence against the extremes of weather. This door has spent the best part of a century in service, and it still does so with style and substance. It has earned all its imperfections and it carries them well
I am no expert, but the matt finish has helped to disguise some of its dings and imperfections and it makes the fielding look crisp, way better than the red gloss before
And my neighbour’s verdict?
‘The undercoat looks very nice. What colour is it going to be?’
Poshbird with Passion 
I love the result but it’s your neighbour who has tickled me most …. reminds me of when my third daughter was born and the lady in the post office asked what we had named her. I told her and she replied ‘oh well, you can always change it’ 🙂
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That’s brilliant. Absolutely brilliant!
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This house came with a hideous PVC door. I had a door made which looks remarkably similar to yours. I’m always after a 30s look so you have cheered me up no end. As the bright red paint was drying on our door, Teenage Son came home from school and put his hand print on it. Five years later and I haven’t had the energy to re-do it.
I love your grey, sorry, Bond Street, but I do like being able to say, ‘it’s the house with the red door’.
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Your door sounds very nice. I know what you mean – it was a very big thing to change from having a red door. But I’ve been trying hard to rein myself in a bit lately and prove to Baz that I can behave a bit. It will soon pass!
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Great colour, and the dings and marks just show it’s colourful history (I bet it’s history has been particularly colourful since you moved in)
And there’s NOTHING wrong with entertaining the neighbours a little- I do it all the time.
It’s also reassuring to know that I am not the only one who vascillates between any number of colour options , some of which (to the uninitiated) might look very similar…………….
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I exhausted the possibilities and I could have lived with one or two of them, but I wanted something a bit stronger. I love it
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Nothing like running commentary from the neighbor!
I think it looks great. My mom wanted a red door, but with robin’s egg blue inside. One of my brothers did color swatches, but she wasn’t happy with any of them. And so it stayed. For a couple of years. My brothers would try to get her to choose, but she just couldn’t commit. Finally, on a trip home, I took her to the paint store, where she was told that for a steel door she had to use certain paint, which immediately limited her choices. That helped so much! She picked her red and her blue, and I painted, in similarly baking conditions. I slept uneasily because they lived near a wild, wooded park that was a favorite for drug dealing, and the door had to stay off overnight to finish drying. (They did have a screen door to protect us from the raccoons).
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Whoa! That’s a lot to deal with in order to paint a door. Kudos!
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