...because home doesn't happen overnight.

Remember when we were living with no interior doors? I do. It wasn’t my favorite time. It’s been about a year since HH hung new interior doors. {We were quoted $2,100 to have the interior doors hung but HH read a bunch of tutorials and DIY’d the install himself over a few days saving us a bunch of money.} Our doors are the berkley style, part of the Masonite West End series. We were able to order them for $85/each through the same company we dealt with for our baseboards. You can read more about why we chose the doors here. We’ve been living with them for a year now and LOVE them.

Yesterday, a rare day when all three kids were out of the house, I decided it was the perfect time to finally paint those doors. Uh, yeah, in my world it takes me a year to get around to painting doors. In total, there are seven of these interior doors {2 linen closets, 2 bathrooms, 3 bedrooms} but I painted the door to our only functioning bathroom right before the The Tile Shop photo shoot and the other bathroom door isn’t hung yet to allow unobstructed access to the room whenever we get around to tackling that back-burnered project. So of the seven doors, I painted five yesterday. And it took me forever. Like, all day. But it was actually pretty relaxing and therapeutic. Maybe that’s because the kids were missing? And I had NPR streaming on the laptop.

I used paint leftover from painting the fireplace. It’s Benjamin Moore white dove mixed in Clark + Kensington primer + paint, semi-gloss.

doordate 1

I painted the doors on their hinges. I used a 1 ½” angled brush to paint the inset detailing & outer edges and to cut in around the hinges and doorknobs. I used a 6″ foam roller on the rest for a nice smooth finish. Each door required two coats of the primer + paint.

The photos don’t do my paint job justice. The pre-primed doors had a flat finish and there were grimy black fingerprints and dirty smudges all over them. The doors look so fresh now and should be easy to wipe down from here on out.

FYI – It’s really gloomy here today so artificial lighting was a must in these after shots.

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The subtle inset detailing on the doors is perfect for our small, door-ridden hallway. We feared that any door with more prominent detailing might make our teeny hall feel busy and not mesh with our home’s midcentury roots. Everyone that comes over comments on the doors. They’re simple and modern, a design you don’t see everyday.

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We went with matte black hinges and doorknobs for a little contrast. I’m so glad we did! They are little surprises against all the white.

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I’ve always been a sucker for room-to-room shots and the newly painted doors have only strengthened my weakness. Does that even make sense?

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I’m also giddy about experimenting with door-not-all-the-way-open shots. Yes, these are the things I find exciting.

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Also, this post could have been titled “The One Where Mabrey Does a Fair Share of Photobombing.”

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I thought this trio of pictures might help illustrate some not-so-interesting points.

1 – Looking down the hall from the great room. The door at the end is a linen closet. A second linen closet, the unfinished kid/guest bathroom, the utility closet and the master bedroom are on the left – in that order. Mabrey’s room and the boys’ shared bedroom are on the right – in that order. There is a lone book on the floor at the end of the hall courtesy of Mabrey. It’s an original copy of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.

2 – Turning to the left and looking into the hall from the great room. There’s a very short hall to the kid/guest bath. The door you see is the second linen closet. Down the hall, you can see the louvered doors to the utility closet.

3 – Looking out into the hall from Mabrey’s room. HH found the louvered doors on the side of the road on his way home from having custom louvered doors priced out at several home improvement stores. He was returning home empty-handed {the estimates were, quote, “ridiculous”}, brainstorming less expensive options for the utility closet when he spotted these on the side of the road in our neighborhood. Most of the houses in our ‘hood are similar to ours so HH figured the size was close enough and the price certainly was right. He only had to cut them down a little to install them onto the new track. The louvers allow air to circulate {a necessity when heat-emitting machines are behind ’em} but keep the ugly mechanics out of sight. I haven’t painted these doors yet. They’re next on my list.

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This is the master bathroom door I painted months ago. Now the rest of the doors match.

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And one more half-open door shot because you couldn’t possibly be bored with these yet.

images: Dana Miller for House*Tweaking

50 Comments

15.October.2013

beautiful door! where did you buy those?

15.October.2013

I really like your door choice. Super unique. I also like that paint color in your daughters room. Everything looks really nice.

It looks fantastic! I love the simplicity and for some reason they look wider than most doors which is really nice

15.October.2013

Loooovely! We replaced all of our interior doors with Masonite ones shortly after we bought our house too. We got them hung pretty quickly, but it took me 2 years to paint all 9 of them. and I am not a procrastinator! Painting doors is just plain hard. I can’t believe you did 5 in a day! I guess mine had a bit more detail that made them a bigger pain in the ass. Anyway! Bravo on a job well done :)

15.October.2013

Love these doors, thanks for sharing! Can you tell me where you found your hallway runner and if it has a rubber backing (or how you keep it from moving around)?

Thanks!

15.October.2013

So pretty! What’s your hallway wall paint color?

15.October.2013

I also love the paint color in your daughter’s room! What is it?

15.October.2013

Love the doors. I’m having serious door envy. And good find on the side of the road! This weekend I also picked up a few sets of interior shutters off the side of the road (and hauled them 4 blocks balanced on my bike) that I want to put in our kitchen but was dreading the store-bought price tag. Kinda makes you want to sneakily prowl the neighborhood.

15.October.2013

Every little and not-so-little thing you cross off the list has to feel good (I just revised our house and yard to-do list and it’s nearly 2 pp long, sigh). Your doors are perfect, and so is the timing on those roadside louvered doors. But the best part of this post is, of course, Mabrey. :D

15.October.2013

I love those doors! And $85 seems pretty darn reasonable to me. We have hollow-core doors (with a wood veneer) in our 1950s colonial and until my husband mentioned the veneer, I assumed we could just re-stain them a darker color. So in addition to the fact that they’re all a bit too short (thanks to the wall-to-wall carpeting that covered the wood floors for the past 60+ years, the bottoms were shaved off!), now I find out that my only option is paint? Sounds like time to add ‘replace the doors’ to our never-ending home improvement list!

15.October.2013

Mabrey’s room is painted Benjamin Moore dark pewter.

15.October.2013

The hall color is Benjamin Moore tapestry beige – same as the kitchen and living area.

15.October.2013

The seagrass runner is from Overstock. It has an olive cotton border. Right now I have cheap-o rug pads from the Dollar Store under it but I need to invest in something better. Over time, the rug shifts.

15.October.2013

Just google “masonite berkley” and see what you come up with. We ended up ordering ours through a private business that offers molding, baseboards, trim, etc.

15.October.2013

I love the door knobs and hinges in the black! Do you mind sharing where you got them and also the tutorial on hanging doors? That might come in handy one day!

15.October.2013

Ok I know this post is about the doors and yes, the doors are beautiful. But Mabrey is so stinkin’ cute! She steals the show in this post. Can’t get over her hair clip. Love it!

15.October.2013

Love the doors! And your entire house actually! I have a quick question- I noticed the rug in Mabrey’s room and think it’s one I’ve been eyeing at West Elm. If so- can you share your thoughts on its comfort level? I thought it might be scratchy?

15.October.2013

Since you mentioned baseboards in your post, I really like the style you selected and they complement those great doors! Which height did you choose? We are wanting to replace our baseboards. Ours are “wimpy” by comparison and because they don’t have a flat top to finish them off, painting walls becomes quite a chore.

15.October.2013

Love watching a toddler go about their business. My baby (17 mo) struts all over the house getting her daily bid-ness done. Total joy watching it all. :)

15.October.2013

Danielle, do you have one central cold air return for your house? If so, having a larger gap at the bottom of your doors is a good thing. It helps with air circulation and improves your HVAC efficiency. I think they suggest at least a 1″ gap in those cases. If you have dedicated returns in each room, then it’s less necessary.

15.October.2013

Nice doors, I need some too. Forclosed houses seem to have doors with holes or none at all!

15.October.2013

I did this exact same project in February! I went a little longer…maybe 2 years, without painting my doors upstairs. I took a couple of days off work to tack on to my regular 4 days off and painted all the trim in the bedrooms, bathroom, hallway, etc, and then painted 2 bedroom doors/1 bathroom door, and 5 closet doors, plus finally stained the new banister that I put at the top of the stairs. It was a long week, I do not find painting as therapeutic as you;)

The doors look absolutely lovely, and I love Mabrey’s photobombs!

15.October.2013

Our baseboards are 5 1/2″ tall.

15.October.2013

It isn’t scratchy at all! It’s a jute + chenille mix. The chenille is super soft and high quality jute is actually silky feeling not straw-like.

15.October.2013

Could you, would you, pretty please from my begging heart do a series or post on how you edit down to fit into your house? Like the nitty gritty. Yes you got rid of stuff… But HOW do you live daily in a house with so little space?!

We are a family very similar to yours. Live in a ranch style home that is 1250 square feet with two boys, 6 & 2, and a surprise little girl who is one in a month. I keep throwing things out, but we are still SO CRAMPED. There is stuff everywhere. How did you edit your kids toys? My eldest will remember a toy from a year ago that I threw out and finally ask me where it is. He had been looking everywhere. :-( I am lost! Frustrating that we have less than half the kid toys and adult stuff than that of our friends and yet I KNOW it it still too much. Also, we don’t really have an attic, it is a crawl space full of my husband’s hoard of Christmas display stuff, and I am cheap and refuse to pay for storage. Is that what I am missing?

Love your new home. I like it better than the large one, probably since I am determined to love my similarly sized home with the same sized family! I desperately want to turn our little ranch into a cozy, much less cluttered and inviting home. Help!

15.October.2013

Oh have fun with those louvered doors! I’m in the midst of re-painting just a single door that was on our pantry. It’s taken literally 4 hours just to prime one side of the door. And that was after at least 8 hours of sanding (because a previous owner had repainted badly at one point – i.e. drips everywhere). You have to go one slat at a time and slowly to keep from getting drip and splotches. So mind-numbing. There that should make you procrastinate at least another year – LOL!

16.October.2013

I love the style and color of your doors. And the color in your daughter’s room is gorgeous.

16.October.2013

Thanks, Dana, for the info. I appreciate it!

16.October.2013

A couple of weeks ago, you wrote that HH worked all weekend on the front entry door. Will you be posting the results soon, and does that mean the door is now functional?

16.October.2013

We’ve been working off and on on the front door. We’re just waiting on a new handset {to arrive today!} before we can install it, paint the door and call it done. Several weeks ago I removed the old house numbers, old screen door and accompanying hardware that went along with all that stuff. I cleaned up the door and trim to get a better idea of what we’re working with. HH recently installed new thresholds outside and inside, trim outside and inside and cut the door to fit over the new thresholds. We’re getting there!

Must feel so good to have that done! And I love your room to room shots. All our doors need to be painted too, about 8 counting closet doors. Someday we’ll get there :)

These look fantastic! I’m super impressed that you painted these on the hinges. I don’t think I could steady my hand enough for that! :)

16.October.2013

Thanks so much for the info. I had no idea jute could be silky, I always assumed it was scratchy! I appreciate all the information you’re willing to share and your beautiful blog.

16.October.2013

I’ve been meaning to ask you this FOREVER…I’ve been thinking of ordering one of those rocking chairs like the one in Mabrey’s room for our nursery. But have always wondered how comfortable they are? Are you happy with it? Is it comfortable for nursing? Also, where did you purchase yours and price? They have one on Hautelook right now for $130 which seemed like a good deal to me.
Thank you :)

Love the door choice Dana. They look amazing. I also really love that you went with black hardware. Yet another awesome addition to a gorgeous and chic home.

17.October.2013

I bought the chair on Overstock. By the time I got the rocking chair for Mabrey’s nursery, we were beyond the newborn hour-long feeding sessions. With a lumbar pillow behind my back, the chair was comfortable enough for 15-20 minute nursing sessions. I am petite but to this day HH and I use the rocking chair every naptime / bedtime to give Mabrey a bottle, sing to her or read her books. The chair is still going strong! Eventually, I think it will end up in the living room when the crib is replaced with a larger bed.

17.October.2013

I checked with my husband and we do have cold air returns throughout the house. In my defense, I’ve always lived in old houses and all our registers/vents look the same to me!

But thanks for that useful bit of information!

Dana, I have to say that your photography is amazing. I remember a while back you mentioned taking the Shoot Fly Shoot online classes. What are your other sources as there were only two Photography classes available so far.

17.October.2013

I think I mentioned Nicole’s Classes, an online photography class. I haven’t taken the Shoot Fly Shoot class so I can’t vouch for it. Here’s a link to the class I took…

http://nicolesclasses.com/portfolio/photo-101/

It’s directed more towards taking photos of products and people but I was able to apply what I learned to shooting interiors. I always shoot in manual now!

17.October.2013

I love the doors! Also love the doorknobs and hardware, and am in the market for something very similar – do you mind sharing the whats and wheres of your doorknobs?

18.October.2013

Hey there – I love your door choice and I wish we would have been more open-to-other-ideas when we chose our doors. I feel my six-panel doors are so bor-ing! Oh well. :)
( I have to note – though I know the bringing-up-baby-tips aren’t always your favorite readers’ gifts – that in the picture of Mabry reading, she looks like she might be “W” sitting. If by chance she is I would offer that it is an unhealthy habit for kids. I work in our school district’s Early Learning Center and elementary schools and we see kids all the time who have gotten used to sitting that way and it’s a hard habit to break. It is very bad for their hips and core balance and other things in the long run – even though kids are comfortable doing it. The physical therapists and teachers in our schools always, always correct the kids and have them sit “crisscross applesauce” on their bottoms. If she wasn’t sitting that way feel free to offer that I MYOB. :) If she was I would try and get her to change. :) Sorry – I just had to stick in my two cents! MA )

21.October.2013

Mabrey is so adorable! I love the little bows you always have in her hair and the picture you posted n instagram of her in her little ankle booties – too cute! You definitely have good style (not just in your home but also in your family’s wardrobe!)

23.October.2013

I totally get the loving taking pictures through doorways thing. We just sold our 100 year old house, which had original 5-panel interior doors, and my favorite vantage point in the whole house was standing in the upstairs hallway looking into my son’s room through the doorway. I had a sweet little vignette of a dresser, some etsy prints and a great vintage lamp just beyond the door and it honestly makes my heart hurt a little that I never bothered to take the time to take some pictures of that spot.So, photograph away!

05.November.2013

Love all of your posts! Where did you get your doorknobs? I am looking to replace mine.

05.November.2013

[…] Benjamin Moore white dove mixed in Clark + Kensington primer + paint, semigloss…the same as these doors.} It was pure chaos and it took me all day to apply three coats of primer + paint. Remind me never […]

24.June.2014

[…] *https://www.housetweaking.com/2013/10/15/a-date-with-my-doors/ […]

16.March.2015

Hi!

Just wondering where you got your door knobs and hardware??

Thanks!

01.March.2016

Hello. I am looking for plain black matte doorknobs and hinges. Where did you find yours? Thank you.

19.March.2016

Did you have to cut the doors down (height wise)? If so did you cut the bottom or the top? or both?
Thanks

21.February.2017

Hello! Can you pleas share where you got the matte black doorknobs?