• Home
  • About
  • Blog
  • Portfolio
  • Services
  • Contact
  • Nav Social Menu

    Let’s Connect

    • Email
    • Facebook
    • Instagram
    • LinkedIn
    • Pinterest

River Studio Design

Where style meets functionality

You are here: Home / Home / Seven Things to Think About When Choosing a Front Door

Seven Things to Think About When Choosing a Front Door

Blog, Design, Home, Windows and Doors

5 shares
  • Share
  • Tweet

Choosing a front door that enhances the style and function of your house is not always simple. Here are some of the things that we considered when choosing a front door.

When we bought our river house four years ago, it looked like this.

Marina Drive (before)
Marina Drive (before)

Our house leans toward mid century modern, but over the past 35 years, several owners have tried to put on their own stamp and make this house something else. The traditional front door is a good example of that. The lack of balance due to a side panel on one side only bothered me also; it pushed the actual door into the corner.

When it came time to replace the door, there were a number of things we considered:

1. Respect the style of the house

For us, I was looking for mid century modern doors and did a lot of research as to what was available in that style. Have a look on Pinterest or Houzz for country or farm house doors if that is the style of your house, or traditional or modern depending on what you are looking for.

Pink traditional doors Photo by @GlerenMeneghin on Unsplash

2. Choose a substance that will hold up to your weather conditions

For us, a metal, insulated door was the obvious choice. It stands up to lots of life and to extreme weather conditions living in Canada. Wood doors are lovely but do require some maintenance. This is the same for glass doors. Glass might be better suited to warmer climates, and this is the same for fibreglass. Check out the best options for your climate.

Glass Door Photo @bernardhernmant on Unsplash

3. Consider balance when adding side lights

I am a bit obsessed with balance, so a side panel on just one side makes me personally feel uncomfortable. In our case, it pushed the door into the corner. But there are many beautiful, balanced options with sidelights on both sides.

4. Get the size right.

Once we got rid of the side panel we had 60 inches of space to deal with. @Geraintthewelsh loves a big door for moving furniture, so we were able to add a 42 inch door and the installers were able to fill in the extra few inches. You may have flexibility if you had one or two side panels previously to increase the size of your door.

5. Windows in a door are a good way to add light to an entry way

I like to add windows to the door or side panel whenever possible to add light to an entry way. Many people don’t like clear glass so that people can see in your house, but there are many frosting options available.

6. Adding colour to the front door is a great way to perk up the exterior

I absolutely love a coloured front door, especially when it is a well chosen colour. I could not convince the family to go for a cool colour on our front door, but I am happy with the choice of black. We also had it painted black on the inside. Just make sure that if you are painting a door unit after purchase that you do one of two things. Either paint the door, side panels and trim all the same colour, or paint the door and the side panels one colour and the trim another colour. I personally prefer the everything one colour.

A Bright and Shiny Yellow
A Bright and Shiny Yellow

7. Choose door hardware to match the style of your door

This goes back to sticking with the style of your house and the style of the door. Stay in your lane and choose hardware that is in keeping with your style choices. We chose modern brushed metal hardware with an entry code pin. I cannot tell you how much easier this had made things at our house. Instead of issuing keys that get lost and leaving the door open for people that come home late, the door can just be locked and family members have access. We can even give the code to contractors to enter and then change it after they are finished. There are lots of possibilities and we love it.

Here is a photo of our house with the new front door, taken before the snow came last year.

Marina Drive (after) Summer Sunset
Marina Drive (after) Summer Sunset

You can read about the challenges of a Canadian winter here.

I hope this helps you when choosing a new door for your home. This is our new front door. Please excuse the reflection of the snow shovel in the photo. Canadian winters eh?

What style did you choose? I would love to see the final product!

Always

Leslie

River Studio Design
River Studio Design


Tweet
Pin
Share5
5 Shares

12/03/2019 · 2 Comments

Previous Post: « Five Ways to Live A Beautiful Life Waiting For Spring
Next Post: Update on New Foam Mattress »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. plumbing blocks autocad says

    13/10/2020 at 1:25 AM

    Spot on with this write-up, I honestly believe this web site needs far more attention. I’ll
    probably be back again to see more, thanks for the information!

    Reply
    • Riverstudiodesign says

      25/10/2020 at 8:44 AM

      Thank you

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You have to agree to the comment policy.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

Latest on Instagram

Follow on Instagram

Lets connect!

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest

About

My name is Leslie Buchanan-Jones. I love design and all things beautiful that function well. I am a mom of three thriving young adults and am married to an awesome Welshman. Follow me on my journey.

Subscribe for tips and tricks on making your house a beautiful and functional home!

Footer

Join us!

Subscribe for tips and tricks on making your house a beautiful and functional home!

Privacy Policy Disclosures

About

Contact

 

Let’s Connect

  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest

Copyright © 2023 · anchored theme by Restored 316

5 shares