Give your front door a facelift

By the time my husband and I bought our house, someone had long ago replaced the front door. Here’s a shot showing the original, a traditional farmhouse door:

And here’s the door we got when we bought the house:

There’s nothing wrong with a midcentury door—when it’s on a midcentury house. But midcentury our house ain’t, so we knew some kind of facelift was in order.

Years ago, before Pinterest, I saved this photo to my desktop:

(I have tried unsuccessfully to locate the original online, so if you’ve got a link, please send it my way.)

It’s still a favorite image of mine. So I got a wild idea that maybe we could get a similar look with the door we had and with a lot of help from a contractor.

Because the front door was solid wood, our contractor said he could cut a round window and add panels too. As for the color, we were inspired by this house in Ogden, Utah:

I knocked on their door to ask for the color and got no answer. So I sent my handsome husband over, and the lady answered right away and peeled paint off an old paint can for us to match (#goodlooksgetresults). Yellow can be pretty hard to get right, so seeing this color on a real-life house helped us nail the shade the first go ‘round. We painted the door before adding the new window to make sure we liked it:

And here’s the final result:

Our entire door project cost less than $500, and you’d be surprised how many people think it’s original to the house. If you’ve got a lackluster wood door, don’t be afraid to give it a makeover—it’s an easy way to bolster your curb appeal. And then send me a photo!

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