Our Front Door

We think our front door is original to the house. We like it and we want to keep it. We did look into replacing the front door but we didn't find anything that looked similar without custom ordering and that would have cost us about $2,000, an amount we weren't willing to pay. So we compromised.

So what did we do? We hired a local furniture refinisher, Don Behlke, to come and remove the door and and strip it down for us. We also asked that he remove the glass as it was cracked and we were going to replace that. Dave knows how to cut glass so that would also save us some money.

Don began the work then called us. The door had had a lot of repairs and was partially repaired with plaster. It couldn't really be refinished. Don had completed the hard parts by removing the glass and getting the door sanded down. He charged us $50 for his work and we picked up the door and decided to paint it over, add the glass and rehang it.

Color: I didn't want the traditional red door on a gray house. I wavered between dark blue and this yellow/gold color. I decided to be bold and went with the yellow. I still like it. We primed the door and painted it, cut and fitted the glass, and glazed it, replaced the old hardware and rehung it.

Storm Door: The storm door that was there before was, I think, what you call a cross-buck door. It was half window. It was dirty and dented and didn't fit the house very well either. We opted to buy a new, full-light storm door that would allow our newly painted front door to show through. It's almost like you have the protection of a storm door but it isn't there. You focus on the front entry door and not on the storm door.

Why did we do these doors before we finished the house? It was a concession on Dave's part. He wanted to rehab the barn first and my concession was that I could buy all new bathroom towels and get a new front door. LOL. I guess I won. The barn is waiting until we get the house done and I got the new towels and the front door.

If you want to contact Don Behlke, make a connection through The Brick House Antique Center in Palmyra, NY at (315) 597-3883. I have also linked to Brick House in the links section of this blog.