Shut The Front Door

Right now (as I write this post, not when it posts), the front door is hanging open. It’s needing a few hours of dry time thanks to a new, shiny paint job. And I’m totally smitten.The new exterior siding and trim colors (Basketry and Rustic Cream, both by Behr) improve the look of the Ugg-Duck miles above what it used to be. But even though improvements were taking place, they all seemed a bit blah when looking at my work from a distance.

I didn’t blame the fact that I had let the plants fend for themselves over the last month (which of course means either withering away or growing out of control). I didn’t blame the unfinished upper floor contrasting with the newly painted parts. I blamed the door.

I think I see Charlie in the reflection. Goofy dog.

Not that there’s anything wrong with red, but the doorway left a lot to be desired. First of all, the storm door has a pimple.

Wait, let’s zoom in closer.

Okay, so it’s not a pimple, it’s a buckling in the insulation strip. I’m not sure how such a thing occurs, but the rest of the house makes a strong argument of former owner neglect, so that blemish has probably been around for a while. And I suspect it’s been like this for so long that if I tried forcing it back into place, the strip would probably break (it’s brittle and stiff from being exposed to the elements for so long in this position). Therefore, my choices are to either:

1. Replace the weather stripping and fix the door, OR
2. Remove the storm door and let the front door take center stage.

It’s a personal choice, but I think I’m going with #2. I don’t really like storm doors, and this one in particular has scraped the back of my ankles on a number of occasions (OUCH, btw). So to save myself a few pints of blood, I’m thinking of removing the problem altogether.

Once it’s removed, I’m going to be left with just the rusty red door itself. It too had a number of things about it that I’m not a fan of, like the brass kickplate on the bottom. Again, it’s a personal preference sort of thing, but the kick plate getting the boot just like the storm door.

The paint on the door itself was old and dingy, but nothing that a good scrubbing and a new coat of paint couldn’t fix. It looks a bit more impressive in the photo above, but I took the closeup picture for a better reflection of the scratched and dirty surface.

Needing to paint the door brought an opportunity for an entirely new color to go with the rest of the new color scheme. A cement slab is part of the front stoop, and it too was painted the same ruddy red as the door.

It’s seen better days. Red may be great for the front door, but it’s definitely not the best color for the slab, so I thought it best to paint both something entirely fresh.

Not everything is being thrown away. Something I do like about the door is the knocker. The tarnished brass color isn’t great, but that can easily be fixed with a little spray paint (to match the recently replaced exterior light).

The plan for the upcoming week is to remove the storm door, chuck the brass kick plate, and prep both the slab and front door for the new paint color.

What paint color did I choose? What does the new door look like? You’ll have to wait for tomorrow’s post. Because I’ve still got work to do!