One of the first things we did when we moved in was take the door knocker off the front door. Why, you ask? Because it was engraved with the name of the former owners, and after all we went through in the house hunt, I wanted OUR name on the door.
Actually, I didn’t want anyone’s name on the door, but rather a plain ol’ knocker. But you get the idea.
So down came the giant brass door-knocker:
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| Door knocker – he’s a biggun’ |
Obviously, this is the back of the door knocker, but I’m not trying to put the former owners on blast here. Trust me when I tell you, their name is engraved on the front.
To replace it, we bought this simple, understated oil-rubbed bronze knocker:
And guess what? The holes weren’t spaced right. Apparently, the Biggun’ was a custom knocker and try as we might, we couldn’t find one just like it in stores or on-line. And we had no love for the idea of drilling another hole through the front door.
So, I turned to the Spray Paint Fairy. I had some heat-resistent glossy black interior/exterior paint leftover from a minor project I undertook in the family room (the fireplace screen had strips of golden brass across it, and it annoyed me), so I broke it out and gave the knocker a few coats. Not only did it look spiffy and new, but you couldn’t see the engraving anymore either. Two birds, one stone, I like.
Unfortunately, in our attempts to get it back on the door (or perhaps in our attempts to get it off in the first place), some of the paint got scratched off. No beuno. But, to be fair, the paint was looking pretty weathered anyway, and I wasn’t real fond of the color to begin with.
Up until I got up real close to it, I always thought the door was black and matched the shutters. But, alas, I was wrong. It’s actually this dark, maroony-brown color that I don’t even have a name for. And you can see that giant brass knocker even in pictures taken across the street.
I was up for one of two options: 1) paint the door black to actually match the shutters; or 2) paint it bright red to really pop. The Mister nixed the black idea, and after we saw a house in Colonial Williamsburg sporting a bright red door with black shutters, I too was firmly on the red door bandwagon.
We scooted ourselves over to our local Lowes and picked up a bazillion red chips, and taped them all to our door. We checked them out in the morning light, the afternoon light, the evening light, the sun light, the cloudy day light…you get the idea. And slowly, but surely, we pulled down every chip until just one was left: Valspar Cut Ruby.
I removed the freshly painted Biggun, and just taped off the doorknob. We have a glass screen door, so luckily I was able to keep the front door open all day long while I painted.
When people tell you red is a hard color to paint evenly….believe them. It took about six or seven thin coats (over a coat of Kilz) to finally get that door spiffy-fied.
But well worth it:
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And here’s some close-ups of the previously discussed, new and improved door knocker.
We were originally planning to put on a new doorknob, but then we’d have to have everything re-keyed so we could still have just one key for the entire house. So, now we’re considering giving it a coat of spray paint instead, so it matches the knocker. Either way, it’s pretty much hidden from view by the storm door frame/handle, so we’re going to leave it be for now until we figure out. In the meantime, I’m going to daydream about this beauty:
Ain’t she purty? Someday, she will be ours.
Where Love is Home 