Go for the wooden doors and stain them to match. Frankly, a painted door with stained trim is ugly.

^^^Well, ugly is a bit harsh and just an opinion after all. The OP wants to consider it as an option and there are examples worth looking at. Here's a link to some on Pinterest A lot will depend on what your stain will be and what your actual wall colors will be - just saying medium and mild doesn't really give a clue. Your wood will have a color (even though we sometimes like to think of wood as neutral) and so will your walls so those really need to work together regardless of whether you paint or stain the doors.

DLM, you're right. Sorry CTSnicholas! I should follow my dad's example. He never said anything was ugly, he'd just pull on his goatee and say "that's unusual!" My mother and sisters knew what he meant, though.

Do you have photos of what is currently there?

Well...I guess it has a lot to do with your preferred sense of color harmony and preferred aesthetic. The greater the number of different finish materials (stain, paint, primed or pre-finished doors and materials, etc.), the greater the challenge for harmony and unity. Said differently, the greater the diversity, the greater becomes the potential for a less harmonious and unified result.

The other important issue is "contrast", i.e., the extent to which you want objects to stand out and visually contrast with adjacent objects, or the extend to which you want everything to blend in together and nothing calls undue attention to individual objects.

For example, the visual differences between stained trim with painted doors will certainly cause the doors to contrast with the trim (paint vs. stain).

But you should also keep in mind that stained trim with painted walls will cause the trim to contrast with the walls! So you have already created a challenging situation!

FWIW, I always recommended all stain or all paint, but almost never attempt to blend stained objects with painted objects, whether indoors or out! Of course, we're all different, and there's always exceptions to every "rule".

I hope this gives some helpful insights! Good luck!

I'd go for the stainable doors. You can always paint a stained door, if you don't get the solid wood doors, you give up that option entirely. And the wood doors will have a certain feel and heft to them that will convey that extra quality.

Pricing wise, the wooden interior doors are more than double. The front door on the house also costs a good chunk more to get a stainable fiberglass material. If I have wood interior doors, I would want at least the inside portion of the front door to be wood, too. However, it is more of an oak and limited to gel stain kits, while my trim will definitely be pine. I feel like I may have too much wood in the house after wooden birch cabinets, stained pine base, stained pine window jambs, stained pine window casing, and stained pine door casing. Wooden doors would flow with the wood trim, but they would be big chunks of stained wood. Looking around online I see a lot of painted trim and stained wooden doors but NOT near as much stained trim and painted doors. However, I have wondered if I had doors painted a darker color, then maybe the wood stained trim would not look so broken up from the doors. Hoping to get a second opinion on this idea and if anyone has some photos of what I am talking about that'd be good to look over.

I have also considered painting the doors the same color as the walls they are hung on. I was told to do this by a finish carpenter, but his ways are considered different than most finish carpenters. The idea is good if each wall is the same color, but in the house I will have two doors in the living room as an earthy light green while the hallway will all be a cream or white.

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I take back what I said earlier, because looking at these examples, what happens is the stained frame creates a picture frame effect around the doors making them a feature and pulling your eye towards them.

I think either you need to paint your trim around the doors and the doors or go with stained doors too.

The challenge with stained trim and painted walls is C-O-N-T-R-A-S-T! Natural (brownish) stains and painted walls (especially white hues) is that they always, always strongly contrast with one another. When it comes to doors, they can either be stained to match the trim or painted to match the walls, but it doesn't matter. They always set up a high degree of visual contrast.

Now, if the architectural design has been conceived from the outset with this in mind, the contrast can be pleasing and attractive, as in some of the first of CPA's photos.

On the other hand, if this was not part of the vision for the design of the house from the outset, and trim sizes, placement and proportions are simply random as installed by the trim or finish carpentry subs, the result can be visual cacophony, which can be seen in last couple of photos CPA posted.

FWIW, as an architect with some sensitivities (I'm pretty sure), I've never understood why trim and doors would not be similar, whatever the finish may be.

So it boils down to design and personal preference which means it's really what the owner likes best I suppose. I do believe a dark stain and white door can look very crisp but also out of place while a dark painted door may look more suitable with dark stained trim. I do prefer a lighter stained pine instead of dark, so I am hoping I could get away with a crisp white door color, or a cream color to accent the light stained wood. Though that may just look dirty.

My other thought was to paint each door the same color as the wall it is against. This means the doors would vary in color. Would that look out of place? You would not see the different door colors at the same time because there are only two colors in the main open living space of the home. Bedrooms and bathrooms would have the interior side of the door painted but down the hall would all be the same color.

Pine is not a good wood for staining, since it has a lot of irregularities, plus the knots continue to bleed sap for a long time. There are much better woods for either staining or painting. Ditch the pine!

Pine is a soft wood and does not take stain evenly; plus it dents and snags etc. if you want the wood look consider ash, oak, poplar I think is a nice density and planes well.

I detest the appearance of oak. All our stuff is either pine or maple. Nearly all of our woodwork (doors and moldings) are a good grade pine and it is stained evenly and beautifully. We reserved maple for the stair treads and some of the flooring. I was a little reluctant and was going to suggest to the builder that we put a pre-stain treatment (recommended for pine) on first, but the stuff has come out pretty flawless and even with just the stain.

Our pine is CLEAR and doesn't bleed sap (such is a problem with paint grade pine with knots, you must seal the knots or any pitch pockets with shellac...kilz works well).

As I have studied this stain/paint and contrast issue over the years, I can say with confidence that painting the doors with the wall paint color will create a similar contrast as a white door. But in an odd way. Either way there is a pine stained piece of wood between your wall and door. White doors do not look good to me in the above examples. If I were you I would stain the doors and as an added bonus they will look clean around the same time white doors would start looking dingy!