I like it. The new color is much more sophisticated, and dropping the shutters makes the door more important. Great lights, too!

Wow! It looks great! I remember your old post. It turned out beautifully! Can you share the color of your front door?

It looks wonderful, you must be thrilled!!!

What a pretty place! Congrats on the lighting. I haven't the nerve when it comes to things electrical.

That's just lovely! The house looks so much better without the shutters! The lighted steps are fabulous, and you have really lovely landscaping. Congrats!

Beautiful!

I love your home without the shutters and it looks like you heightened the window moldings on the first floor windows.

You really increased the curb appeal, IMHO.

Wow it looks fantastic!

Beth P.

It was a lovely home before, but is even more so now! Love the new color and am so impressed with your new walkway. You wired the lights yourself? Wow!
Lynn

Thanks for the compliments! I am very pleased with the end results.

The landscaping is all mine, even cut down one of our trees all by myself because I had a vision in my head of how things should be. I have one more change to make to it, but will wait for spring.

The front door color is a factory finish from Provia. It's their Mountain Berry color which, if you go to their website to see the color, looks nothing like the actual paint color at least on my monitor. I did have it color matched, I hope, to Benjamin Moore's Country Redwood in order to paint the back door that goes out to my deck. I haven't done the painting yet so can't say for sure the color matches. If you look at California Stains Old Redwood Storm Stain, I know for sure the color matches the Provia color.

I love the change! Love the color, love it without shutters, love the walkway, love it without railings. Now it's ready for a fabulous holiday trimmming.:)
Dee

Nice job! Your house was nice before, but love the end result. Very classic. Door looks "grander" now and that walkway is fab. You have a beautiful house.

Your deck stain is lovely. Would you mind sharing the stain brand/color? We also have a real wood deck off the back of the house and a small balcony off Master that will need staining. Your color would be perfecto! Thanks:)

It's absolutely beautiful, Sandra! Very well done.

How elegant! A beautiful home, sandra.

Now there's an improvement! Very nice indeed. It all looks good, but I agree with barb5 that what you did to the windows really makes the look. Not all houses look good without shutters, but yours now looks elegant, more spacious, and quite authentic.

Tiny Castles, the deck is finished with TWP 1500 series wood stain. I used 3 parts Rustic with 1 part dark oak. We found the rustic alone too reddish/orange for our taste, but the browns were too blah. We tried a variety of combos before settling on what we did it with. We love it, sort of a redwood look to the deck. TWP is a pentrating oil and can be layered.

Just lovely - the improvements are all so respectful of the house and setting. Love the new color and walkway.

Beautiful improvement! Love it. Your walkway is gorgeous and the color of your home is so much more warmer and inviting. Great job.

Haley

Amazing. I agree w/barb and lynxe. Very instructive as to how you can take the same architecture and make it look extremely different.

The steps are beautiful too--getting rid of the large wood pieces makes a nice difference in itself, and then there's the rest of the fabulousness, e.g. the subtle colors of the stones, the lights, etc. When you say the landscaping is "all mine", do you mean the hardscaping too, as in you *did* the stairs *yourself*? If so, that is Great Work! I'd dearly love a separate thread on how you did it. I'm in awe. You must be in amazing physical shape. We need to replace our tree-root-broken concrete path to our house...I've been putting it off but maybe if you were to share tips that make it doable, I'd be inspired to start training for next spring : )

Really nice! I love the walkway.

Beautiful house!

sandra, your updates look fantastic - you did a wonderful job! Re: your walkway - is that bluestone? We have a bluestone walkway/steps and didn't wire them for lighting which was a huge mistake. Have you use a stone treatment product on it (not considered a sealer because it penetrates the stone and allows it to breathe)? Just curious - we didn't and now it's been recommended that we do.

Lovely home before, but now it looks much more elegant with the added window molding below instead of the shutters and the new siding color! I love the rock wall by your shrub beds, too, that makes the entire walkway even more appealing. Everything is a delightful improvement. I'm impressed with your DIY skills!

No all the hardscaping was done by professionals! The stone walkway and retaining walls were done by a contractor who listened to us and what we envisioned. His mason was incredible! I loved watching him pick out rocks for the walls and risers; he knew what he wanted and would find just what he was looking for. We waited for years for this walkway, knew what we wanted and got it.

I located the lighting, figured out what I wanted and where. They installed the boxes, I did all the wiring. The wires by the front door have been resolved, you no longer see them like they appear in the pictures; realized that after I posted the pictures.

The landscaping, as in plants and design, are mine. Every plant in the front of the house, with the exception of the Japanese Maple, was picked out by us and planted since we bought the home 13 years ago. This time around, hubby removed one overgrown tree and I did the other. I relocated two plants and added in 11 new ones to have better flow and consistancy with color and size in the front bed. I love how the trunk of the Japanese Maple stands out now; it is the specimen piece it should be. Hubby and I picked out a few rocks from around our property, CT so we have many, that we moved into the bed and it was the perfect final touch to the front beds with the new walls and walkway.

Hubby and I both stripped the deck, I did the finishing of it. Hubby did patching and prep work for the house staining, I did the stain work while he held the ladder for me where needed. We hired for anything above the first floor windows; no way either of us would go up on a ladder that high!

I installed the window treatments, hubby wanted to hire someone but I did it while he was at work. Primed, caulked and then painted them. :)

I am quite proud of what we can do by ourselves. Things may not come out perfect 100% of the time, but with patience, I do feel that we can do anything we set our minds to. Good thing because budget restraints keep us from hiring!

Very nice, I had to go back and look at before picture. I couldn't believe it was the same door.

Love, love, love what you have done. It looks fresh, clean and updated but still looks natural and somehow more friendly.

This a small thing, and perhaps just a personal quirk of mine...but since you've color matched the front door color anyway...have you considered painting the vertical pieces between your front door and sidelights the same color as the front door and sidelights? IMHO, but I think it would look less choppy, more elegant and updated and give your front door look even more like an impressive front "entrance".

In any event...great job!

I really like the paint color you chose, front door, landscaping and walkway are also beautiful.Good job.

Wonderful example of how "less is more." Esp love the new walkway w/lights and how you can now see the stone wall, so keep those nice new plantings trimmed. :)

dtchgrl, I think it is a personal preference. I personally don't like the complete color block of the door painted like that, while you do. In fact when ordering, there are two options, your way and how we had ours done, and we chose how we had it done.

I do see what you say, but I also see houses that are like that and some look elegant and others look like a solid blob of color. Since I can't see mine that way ahead of time, in person, it's a change I am not comfortable making. Easy to go from light to dark, hard to reverse if I don't like it. I may play with it though and see if I like the door that way. I do see what you are after.

If I do change it, I'll let you know. Who knows, by Spring it may have yet another loook to it! :)

I agree with the blobish statement. Your door looks perfect. The whole exterior is so great. It is so refreshing to see someone take the shutters down versus adding them. (I did the same thing :)

Congrats!

Great job! I love everything you've done. Your house looks beautiful.

Wow what an improvement. Thanks for sharing the final result!

Wow, that's gorgeous! Love the front door and the stairs.

Wonderful transformation!

Sandra, you have a lovely home. I, too, really like the "after" where if I hadn't seen them, I'd think your home looked beautiful to start with.

I wanted to ask a little OT questions? What did you mean "Photoshop" your home? I'm trying to find someone to hire to make me an as-is picture of my home so I can draw on it. I want to bungalow-ize my home a bit, but have no drawing skills!

Please tell me what you did?
Thanks,
Christine

Yep, def a personal preference, no right or wrong on the color of the trim b/t the door and sidelights. I do know what you mean that on some it can be too blob-like all the same color..and more of a pain to go back and cover up the red if you don't like it!
But I do usually like it the best on a door set up like yours...when there is lots of glass area to break up the blob, and the glass on the door and glass on the sidelights clearly co-ordinate together.
Either way, it all looks great...you've found that elusive "curb appeal"!