A House With a Blue Door

Yet another project that was months in the making- This one has been worked on by at least four people over a span of two months! In the middle of all that the roofing extravaganza began and the door was put on hold multiple times. It was a project that was long overdue, from the very first day I saw the house, that old, ugly brown door was the first thing I wanted to rip out!

We picked up the door way back in the middle of September. Odette told me there was an old door that the now deceased neighbor had long ago given to her now deceased husband that she had always thought would look great on the house. I didn’t expect much, but we went over to rummage in the barn and found this beautiful old door, made by hand of solid oak. The years had made their mark, but nothing a fresh coat of Le Vignaud Blue couldn’t fix.

Lena and Clint both spent some time sanding off the old paint, and Clint also started painting the bars during his visit. Later, I ended up stripping the old paint off the door completely, when I realized no amount of sanding would ever get the ten or so layers out of all the cracks. I also shortened the frame, adding a small window above, and shortened the door itself a few centimeters for it to fit. Hanging the door was a little difficult, as I had to hand the whole frame with the door attached since the beams in the kitchen are too low to lift the door from the hinges once it’s in place. The fit was perfect- just a few millimeters on top and botton, it passed perfectly between the beams and the floor! No more terrible scratching noise (if you ever opened the old door, you have that sound etched in your mind forever!) when you open it! Then, a few coats of paint later, and some new hardware and it looks and feels like new… I may have shocked the neighbors a bit with the ultra-blue look, but the change it brought to the house was incredible. The new door along with the new roof, totally changed the house from what it looked like just two months earlier.