Considering we've made several updates on the exterior of our little Bungalow (read more about them here, here, here, and here), I thought it was about high time I shared some of the updates we've been making inside. Just to jog your memory a bit, let's take a look at how you all remember the laundry room looking. Are you sitting down? And not eating? You probably should have an empty stomach for this one.
Look at everything this room has to offer! We have blood (?) stained chevron carpet. It has a bit of a Missoni feel, don't you think? We also have burglar bars and a cat tapestry on our back door. I so wish that I had a photo of the front of the cat tapestry. Let's just say that it's needlepoint and has two ginger cats on it. One of a kind. We also have an even more unique textured vinyl accordion door from the laundry room to our office.
Why? Because clearly with a 30" wide door opening, a 1970s vinyl accordion door was the only answer. On the other side of the room was a random hollow-core builder door (complete with gold hardware) that led to the master bedroom. On the other side of that room was ANOTHER accordion door. Needless to say we knew we'd be replacing 90% of the doors in our house so that they would all match the look and style of our home (and each other for that matter).
We immediately took both accordion doors down, and went doorless for a while. It was just that bad. We went to Home Depot and Lowes to price out what an traditional 5-panel craftsman style door would cost and it was a whopping $200 per door. Ouch. With 10 doors to replace in our house, that was out of the question.
We thought about refurbishing an old door from our local architectural salvage, but those were about the same price and needed a LOT of love. So Derek decided that he would rebuild all of our interior doors one by one.
The two accordion doors were first on the list (since we were currently doorless). They are also they same size so that made things a little easier.
Note: This is not a traditional door making method, this is just what we did with what we had, and it still resulted in a strong solid core door that fit what we needed for this house.
Derek started with a sheet of 1/2" plywood to make up the middle layer of the door, that was cut down to size. This particular door was 80" x 31". He then used 1x4's for the overall frame of the door. Each piece was milled down to 1/2" so that with the trim, plywood, and other side of trim the total thickness came out to 1-1/2" (the standard thickness of interior doors).
He then used wood glue and finishing nails to attach the trim to one side of the door. He used clamping cauls to keep everything tight so that it could dry overnight. He then repeated this process for the other side.
He then repeated this same process for the rails which created the look of a traditional 5-panel door. Once the rail pieces dried, he repeated this for the opposite side as well.
Once all of the trim had cured, he went around all of the edges and filled in any gaps with wood filler, and sanded down any imperfections to create a nice smooth edge around the entire door.
After the door was complete, it was time for paint. Derek primed and painted the door, sanding in between each coat in order to get a nice smooth finish. He ended up doing three finish coats when all was said and done.
With the office already having 3 door swings into the space, we didn't want to add another one, and we also didn't want to block one of the closets when this door was open. We thought about installing a pocket door, but our pantries and other office closet (that room has three closets) made a pocket door impossible. So we decided that a barn door would be the perfect solution. It would be able to perfectly slide against the laundry room and fit nicely behind the backdoor when it was open. Barn door hardware can be pretty pricey so we were pretty excited when we found this set from Home Depot, and the installation was pretty straight forward. We also picked up a nice linear satin nickel pull to match the barn door hardware.
And now for a little before and after-ness.
I am kicking myself for not taking a photo of the beautiful accordion door from the laundry room side when we did our final walkthrough, but you can pretty much use your imagination on how awful it was.
And no, our tile isn't dirty, read more about that fiasco here.
Having a door there really makes the laundry room / breakfast nook feel like an actual room. Now we just have 9 more doors to make and hang! ;)