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We have been working on and off on the front door and entryway for nearly 18 months. In most of my posts, I show off the street side of our house since it is complete.

However, the main entrance of the house is actually on the side of BHH.

When we had the house painted this past summer, we did not have the door or sidelights painted. We saved that for a DIY project. I have questioned that decision in the past months, but our reasoning was that there were an awful lot of little details to attend to on that section of the house, and we did not want to have another layer of paint to deal with during the repair process.

2015

During the summer of 2015, using a heat gun,  I began stripping the paint off the front door. (Layers of horror, I tell you!)

Our door, allegedly built by a Roycroft artisan during the Arts and Crafts Movement, is no ordinary door. It is around 5 feet wide and over 8 feet tall.

The process hummed right along, except the crevices. Layers of oil paint and varnish were embedded deeply into the woodwork.

Before we could finish the door in 2015, the weather turned, and our work on the door had to be set aside until spring.

2016

When warm weather rolled around again, sometime in June, Andy took the reins and began working on the door again. Using the woodworking equivalent of dental tools and some very strong paint stripper, Andy patiently removed more layers of paint from the nooks and crannies. He made a lot of progress, but sadly, there is still more scraping to do. Summer ended, and once again, we did not get to finish the door.

Both Andy and I have considered just slapping a coat of paint on the door and calling it a day. Painting would be the easy way out. However, we have put so much work into the project already that I hesitate to quit now. I have my heart set on staining the door a dark walnut to match the handrail of our foyer staircase. (Photo from summer of 2014)

I cannot seem to let go of the idea of this as a restoration project, and even though we did not finish the front door, we did make progress in other areas.

Screen Doors & Hinges

We removed the screen doors and replaced the broken panels with new screen and machine cloth for durability.

We painted the frames red to match the door on the street side of the house and set them aside.

While the doors were off, I removed layers of paint on all of the hinges and latches. That process revealed beautiful Eastlake hardware. I honestly had no idea there was even a pattern on the hardware. I had a hunch, but there were so many layers of paint on each piece that the surface was completely smooth.

A date stamp on the far left hinge reads 1885.  It must be original to the house since BHH was built circa 1885. The other hinges are Victorian-era. Everything in this house hides a story. Why are there three different hinges? When were they replaced? Why? I did not even know that the left hinge was different until after I removed the paint. Crazy!

(Tip: If you love the look of this hardware, House of Antique Hardware sells replicas. I might replace that odd hinge. I have not decided yet.)

Sidelight Windows

After we had repaired the screen doors, we worked on the sidelights. First, we removed the fixed storm windows.

Once we removed the storm windows, we painted them and set them aside. Using my heat gun again, I softened the glazing putty around the broken pane of glass on the interior window.

I used the heat gun carefully to make sure that I did not crack any of the surrounding glass or set the wood frame on fire. Heat guns are potentially dangerous tools that require a great deal of caution.

Once I chipped out all of the softened putty, I carefully removed the broken pane.

Typically, I try to replace broken panes with antique glass rather than new glass because it looks more authentic. My favorite local glass shop sells wavy glass recycled from old buildings. The owner gave me a replacement pane of authentic antique glass for free. I love developing a rapport with local businesses.

I popped the new window pane into place, secured it with glazier’s push points and putty, and smoothed it with my window repair tool.

Fall 2016

I let the new putty dry for about six weeks before I finished painting. On a warm day about two weeks ago, I touched up the interior windows and scraped off stray paint from the windowpanes.

This week, I finally got back to the storm windows. Andy and I were very sloppy with our painting, so I used a window scraper and a utility knife to remove the extra paint. These tools make the job easy.

Despite all of this progress, there is still plenty more to do. Now that the windows are repaired and painted, we need to reinstall the storm windows and caulk the gap. Also, we need to secure the screen doors and all of the hardware back on the doorframe. The porch ceiling needs to be repaired and painted. Lastly, we will need one more season to work on the front door.

The entryway is a far cry from magazine-worthy at this point, but we are getting there. That said, it is always one step forward, two steps back with this project. As of this writing, the front doorknob has fallen off, and I have set it aside to fix over the weekend. Not everything is smooth sailing here at BHH.

The end of this saga requires a picture. Right now, the main entry looks like this:

I can imagine the finished project in my mind. It is going to be beautiful. We just have to have the patience to see it through.