building a long closet made of six vintage doors

13 years ago

This is my first post to this forum. I'll try my best to describe my remodeling problem.

Our house is 100 years old. The front hall is 27 feet long, 7 feet wide, and 12 feet tall. It is a shotgun design with a set of French doors at the end opening into the back hall. The back hall is 15 feet long, 9 feet wide, and 12 feet tall.

I recently purchased a matched set of six, vintage, dark stained, heart pine doors (one 36x84 and five 17x84)that were never bored for knobs. I would like to have a 15 x 2 foot closet built on the long wall of the back hall making it the same width of the front hall and giving my family a LOT of storage.

There would be two sets of French doors, one 36" door, and one 17" door. The spacing between each door/set of doors would be about 12 inches finished in wood, stained to match the doors.

My questions are, will it look strange to have a series of doors in a row down the entire length of the hall (like a long armoire)? And, will it look strange NOT to build a soffit above the closet, leaving a 4 foot space above it?

I plan to put a church pew on the other side, making the back hall kind of like a mud room.

I would appreciate your comments.

Comments (8)

Susan
13 years ago
i think it sounds wonderful, and i'm jealous!
and i think i'd prefer it to be built in looking,
though an interesting collection overhead could be really nice too. have you got any pics?
66and76
Original Author
13 years ago
Here is a picture of the doors leaning against the wall I want to use for the long closet. The closet will be two feet deep, which will fit right up against the existing door frame.

I think I will put large, colorful paintings the entire length of the wall above the closet---or a mural.

I had a builder come in today for an estimate. He said it would work, and he had some good suggestions. I hope the estimate won't be out of my price range; I'll find out in a couple of days. I spent a few hours after he left cleaning the dust and dirt off the doors---they had been in an old abandoned factory for years before they were salvaged. Now, I need to go over them lightly with steel wool and mineral spirits, restain, then revarnish.

Wish me luck!

Here is a link that might be useful: {{!gwi}}
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Hi again jon1270, Ok, you're right! I'm completely lost on this one. Let me see if I can pose a couple more questions to help clarify things a bit. 1. you'd have to trim the front edge of the jamb back by the thickness of the panelling I'm not sure I understand this. If I trim the front edge of the jamb, I'm going to be cutting into where the hinges are, plus the jamb will no longer be flush with the face of the closet door. Currently, the pair of closet doors are prehung so that when looking at the front side, the doors are flush with the jamb. They are hung with exposed hinges like in the photo, but not with the decorative iron strap. 2. hang the unit so that the trimmed jamb was flush with the wall surface Right now I only have a framed opening, no sheetrock (but they're coming tomorrow morning!). Is this another case where maybe I should not sheetrock the wall around the doors and just apply the paneling directly to the framing studs? 3. The panelling applied to the door would go under the hinge leaves Not sure I understand this. Since I don't have the decorative strap part that goes across the face of the door, would the paneling applied to the door just butt up against the hinge and line up with the edges of the door? 4. Having drywall under the panelling will make the whole installation more difficult, because drwyall isn't flat. It isn't??? What about freshly installed drywall that doesn't have a final texture coat?? 5. The key to making this go well would be making the framing/supporting surfaces flat, plumb and true. So another reason not to sheetrock and just apply paneling directly to flat, plumbed and trued framing studs? If I did this, I would need to modify the jamb width, since I ordered the door with 4 9/16 jamb width, standard width if you're planning on sheetrocking both sides of the door opening. Thanks for sticking with me this far and hope I've made some sense.
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weedyacres
13 years ago
I think the idea sounds great. You don't need a soffit running all the way up to the ceiling (especially since the ceiling is so high), but you do need to have a finished "ceiling" to the closet. It would function like a ledge and you could put stuff on it or paint stuff on the wall above it.
66and76
Original Author
12 years ago
Well, it took a YEAR to get my closet built----not due to actual labor, just life in general. I almost gave up after FOUR very expensive estimates and other bills that had to come first.

I finally found a carpenter who understood my design idea and who gave me a reasonable estimate for the job. Right now, I am in the process of staining the raw wood to match the doors---quite a big project which will take some time as I must mix stain colors to achieve the depth of the door color.

Here are some pictures:
http://s137.photobucket.com/albums/q203/paulaandgene/closet%20%20with%20vintage%20doors/

*I posted this topic under The Old House forum, then remembered I had the original post on this forum. A year sure did go by fast!!!!!!
User
12 years ago
Looks very nice. I was hoping you were successful!
66and76
Original Author
12 years ago
handymac, Thanks! I like to keep an eye on other people's projects on this forum, too. I get so many great ideas here.

My original design was modified: I ended up with 3 sets of French doors. The 36 x 84 door was cut in half to make the 3rd set. So, I have three side-by-side, 5' wide closets.

I'll post more pictures when I have more staining finished.
brickeyee
12 years ago
Build the "closet" as a separate piece if furniture.

It is likely to need to be fastened to the wall for stability, but you can then use thinner wood for the 'jamb' around each door.
Susan
12 years ago
three sets of french doors is what i would have done too.
i can't see your pictures though--any chance you could repost them? i've thought of them often and am so glad you got your vision realized.
and you've inspired me, so i really want to see them as i have a similar project in mind for my walk in pantry.
i'm going to place mine into the front wall of my walk in pantry.
it's 11'6" across by 3' deep. i looking for a pair of really nicely detailed glass doors for either side of the opening.

i'm finding new uses for old doors everywhere i look lately!

building a long closet made of six vintage doors

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Susan

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building a long closet made of six vintage doors

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