Help finishing exterior- at a loss???

9 years ago

We're in the middle of construction of our house and I'm stumped on what to do with the doors. The exterior is cypress board and batten siding, stained SW Spice Chest, with cypress beams in SW Hawthorne. The foundation is covered in a natural slate rock from our property. Ignore the temp porch posts, they will be rocked at the base and wrapped in cypress stained the dark Hawthorne to match the beams.

The doors are fiberglass with a stainable/paintable jamb, I'm torn as to what to do. Do I stain them? If so, dark like like the beams? Or paint them? If so I'm leaning toward a mossy green. Or something totally different? I also have a screen porch on the east side of the house with french doors and 2 back doors that I need to figure out as well.

We have sheetrock up and my husband is ready to be able to lock the house up, I would like to paint/stain doors before we put on the hardware. I appreciate any help or advice!

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Comments (16)

sweet_tea_
Original Author
9 years ago
Another angle of the siding, it's hard to get a good picture, our dirt work is not finished.
sweet_tea_
Original Author
9 years ago
It's hard to get an accurate idea of the siding colors. Here's one more picture.

Thanks again!
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rrah
9 years ago
With all of that beautiful wood, I would suggest something brighter to draw attention to the door. I can see the mossy green, but I think I would choose something blue so that the door doesn't get "lost." It looks like there might be some bluish or gray shades in the stone.

You might post this on the decorating forum also.
dekeoboe
9 years ago
With all of that beautiful wood, I would suggest something brighter to draw attention to the door.

That was my thought too. I would want the front door to stand out.
sweet_tea_
Original Author
9 years ago
Thanks for the feedback rrah and dekeoboe!

That's kinda what I was afraid of if I stained it. I was thinking of a green like SW Thyme Green or a blueish green like SW Retreat. There are some blue/gray tones in some of the rocks.

Or do you have any other specific color suggestions?
Also, what about shutters? Same as door color?

I posted in decor forum as well.
Thanks!
illinigirl
9 years ago
yess! make it stand out. It will look great. I love the exterior of your house, it's so amazing with the stained wood. nice job!
nepool
9 years ago
I like the tones of both those greens, but would go down 1 more color on the wheel so that the door stands out a bit more. Perhaps SW 6206 Oyster Bay?

The woodwork is gorgeous!
Annie Deighnaugh
9 years ago
What's your favorite color? Use it.

Or find an inspiration. Perhaps one of these design seeds...
sweet_tea_
Original Author
9 years ago
illigirl- Thanks for the kind words! I've been following your build, yours is looking fabulous and I wish I as far along as you!

nepool- Thanks! I will check out SW Oyster Bay as well. Thanks for the compliment! I think they did a great job on the siding, the cypress is all rough sawn from a local mill and didn't always want to cooperate!

Annie- Thanks for taking the time to put the seeds together! You're so good at pulling those together so fast!

We both usually lean towards greens,and other natural, earthy tones. But I have been tossing around a more blueish hued green, similar to the first design seed. That's where I got myself confused, will a blue/green tone look better than thyme green with the rock/ siding or conflict. DH is not much help, so I shamelessly came to GW to beg for help!
Thanks again!
rrah
9 years ago
I love the peacock blue in the last seed.(the second from the right) It's bright, but dark at the same time if that makes sense.

I tend to favor greens (my front door is green/black), but something about this house says "blue." I could see you painting the door and sidelights in this blue with the same stain color as the other trim around it.
sweet_tea_
Original Author
9 years ago
rrah- Do you mean stain the wood strips (I don't know their real name) that separate the door, sidelights and transom the dark brown and paint just the fiberglass door body parts blue? If so, I hadn't thought of that either, I guess I was just thinking of doing everything the same color . Now you've given me something else to think about!!
:)
chicagoans
9 years ago
That's a great house! Here are some rough mockups using some of the colors above. (The door would look better IRL because I have just pasted in blocks of color here, so the nuances of the door's panels etc are lost.) Also the door would be in shadow, so the colors would be a bit more muted.

HTH
sweet_tea_
Original Author
9 years ago
chicagoans- Thanks for the kind words. It's been a labor of love, and it's never-ending! :)

Thanks for taking the time to do that! That's awesome!! I'm liking the 1, 5 and 6. What did you plug in there?
Thanks again!
amberm145_gw
9 years ago
I was thinking of a red, like the mushroom seed picture.

I also like the first one that chicagoans posted.
chicagoans
9 years ago
1 - top blue from Annie's post, next to boarded hues
5 - bottom row of Annie's post, second from left
6 - left most color under the mushroom picture
Eyegirlie
9 years ago
Sweet tea, I would cross post on the home decorating forum as we'll. They can be really helpful with this sort of thing.