Not sure there is a "step by step" guide for this, but it is relatively straight forward project. Do you have a carpenter/contractor?

Thanks for responding. No, I don’t. I was hoping to do it myself and not have to bring someone into the house.

Could you post a pic or two. French doors are classic. They pretty much will go with any style. Barn doors are a trend. (Except on barns of course). Trends come and go.

Are you aware that french doors sound proof much better than a barn door? Just saying since you said it’s for an office.

I think we need to have some idea why you want to do this. Are you somehow want to use the french doors but make them a barn door? More info please.

Barn doors are fine for barns. (My barn has them, in fact.) In houses, they make poor doors (no privacy) and waste space. Those who point out their trendiness are correct. Yours will look dated in a decade or so.

Your choice, of course, but I think it would be a mistake.

EDIT: Remember, those places where you get "inspiration" for ideas like this - home "improvement" websites and TV programs - exist not to help you, but to move money from your bank account to the much larger bank accounts of the writers and advertisers.

Thanks for all the comments. I mainly want more wall space because our living room is very small and the french doors take up a lot of space. I just personally like the look of the barn door. i was honestly just looking for a "how to" for the project, but thank you for the input.

I wouldnt put a barn door in place of french doors. You wont gain any wall space. Those doors have to slide to open, so you cant put anything on the wall anyway. If that is your french doors above, what I can see of your house, they fit very nicely, and a barn door will not fit well with the rest of your home. They are useless for any type of privacy too. I wouldnt remove something that fits and works, and looks nice, for a trendy barn door..

I don't have a 'how to' for you, but I also don't see how you'd gain any wall space because a sliding single barn door will take the same space as the French doors you have now.

Your trim will dictate how far forward of the wall barn doors would have to be installed to clear the chair rail. The hardware would need a spacer behind it to give you clearance. In addition, wall space is required to one side the full width of the barn door to allow it to open. You might install a track to enable the two doors to slide one to the right and one to the left, but you with your tape measure will need to decide which way to go. I understand how French doors take floor space, so maybe they need to be removed and the doorway left open. The barn doors would not solve the problem for me.

How about a pocket door?

You Tube how to hang a barn door:

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=youtube+how+to+hang+barn+door&spell=1&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwilmJ--0-DoAhVKT98KHdpSAS4QBSgAegQICBAr&biw=1366&bih=654

I have taken my double doors and put them on a barn door tract so they slide on the wall instead of coming on in the rooms.

I mainly want more wall space because our living room is very small and the french doors take up a lot of space.

A barn door takes up much more wall space than french doors. They are noisy too. You will have to make sure you get the kind of glides that cut down on the noise, but even then they are noisy every time you slide them open or closed. They also allow a lot of noise infiltration from elsewhere in the house; for so many of us working from home now and trying to have a conference call while the kids or husband are in the other room, this is an important issue. Also, unless it's installed skillfully, a barn door sometimes slides open or closed by itself. I think there must be better projects in your home worthy of your time and money.

I agree with everyone else who says a barn door won't save wall space since you have to slide it open. A better idea might be to make the opening smaller and install a single door. At best though, you might gain about 16" of wall space because you would have to make the single door wider than 1 single french door. Either way, it's a lot of expense for very little gain. If you still think you want to do it, you would need to remove the french doors and all the trim. Then you would need to add 2x4 studs to make the opening smaller and then drywall, tape, mud, sand and paint. Then you'll need to re-trim your door and then add the barn door. You can search online for how to make a cased opening smaller.

Worst idea ever.

Aren’t you glad you asked?
;-)
It’s hard to hear advice you didn’t ask for, but some of the best results here happen when OP’s approach this with a thick skin and an open mind.

Allison, you say that the French doors take up a lot of space in a small room. Do you mean they take up a lot of space VISUALLY? If so, you can remedy that by painting the doors and trim the same colour as the walls. I’d do the chair rail too, while you’re at it. Having it all in the same colour will make it look and feel larger.

I know you just wanted step by step instructions, but I hope you are open to other suggestions as well. The recommendations against the barn door come from a good place. No one is trying to pho pho your idea, they just know the pitfalls and are trying to stop you from making a potential mistake.

I think I get the issue. When you state the French Doors take too much space in the Living Room I am guessing that the current French Doors open into the living room and not into the office.

French doors can take a lot of space when you include door swing.

Is it possible to change the swing direction? Can you afford to loose the space in the office?

Barn doors are most often used for directional traffic, closet doors, bathrooms. They look interesting from one side with the large hardware. From the opposite side they look like a hole in the wall with something hanging a few inches from the doorway.

Another non traditional option that may solve your issue could be tall saloon doors with a 90 degree stop.

How about an answer to your question?

You have to state your mechanical ability to explain how to do it? In simple terms.......

The biggest obstacle is finding out what kind of header is above the door to see if you can attach the track to it. Simply put, if above your door doesn't have a solid piece of wood to attach the track then you will have to compensate for it.

Get yourself a stud finder and simply run it across the top of the door frame approx 8" above it. Mark off where you find studs or a header panel.

If you only find studs 16" apart you then have to add a piece of wood to the outside of the wall to the studs. Then attach the track to that piece of wood.Or you can tear out the sheetrock and attach stringers between the studs and then re sheet rock.

Problem with adding the wood on the sheetrock is it pushes the door out 3/4" which can also be a good thing if you have large base moldings.

Doors are heavy and require that upper support to be structurally sound not just using sheetrock anchors.

Look for a door with a soft close and soft open feature. If the track doesn't have one it can be added.

I’m a big fan of barn doors. I just had custom doors installed to close off my dining room (now play room). Why live for the future? so many things we do to our homes are trendy. Who cares. You can always paint the doors or change out different metal hardware if your tastes change. Did your original post change? Closing off half the doorway doesn’t seem like a diy project. Unless you’re a contractor or extremely handy. Did you want to use the existing doors? You could keep your trim (repair where hinges were) and repair hinge holes/paint your doors. My advice is first look up how to turn a hinged door into a barn door without removing trim. Then separately look up how to install double barn doors. Of course, based on my experience, I would not DIY this. BUT, if you keep it simple, you could DIY- it might not look the best but it would get those french doors out of your living room.

here’s the wood strip @GannonCo was talking about

https://www.fourgenerationsoneroof.com/barn-door-installation-without-removing-door-trim/

I agree Katie, but, it also depends upon your house and its style. In the op's case, her house looks quite formal, and a barn door would look totally out of style. In my house it would look completely in place, but, since I despise them , it wont happen. LOL

Lol. Yeah that’s true. My dad still makes horse sounds whenever he comes over. But he admits they’re beautiful. To each their own.

Allison, I can’t help you with the framing part but it looks like your situation is similar to my office dilema. Maybe this post will give you ideas. I have a converted sitting room to office that I needed doors to cover a 60 inch opening. I couldn‘t do a pocket door due to the walls being finished and electrical in Them. I didn’t want two French doors swinging INTO the room and taking up precious floor space. I settled on french doors hung up on a barn door track. I don’t care that barn doors are ”going out of style”, I love them. We mounted them inside my office as they would be open most of the time. And closed during conf calls. We chose glass because my husbands office which is next door to mine has French doors and we wanted to be consistent. I dealt with the issue of the 1” gap between the trim and the door by adding a combinEd two pieces of molding to sit in the outsides of the doors to meet up with the door trim -and ended up with a 1/8-1/4“ gap. Essentially I added trim to the outside of the door. You can’t see it from the hallway, and from the office it just looks like a 1/2” trim piece. I added trim above the door (to decrease the height of the opening) to hide the rolling bar from the hallway. And I added floor guides to keep the doors snug to the wall where I want them without scratching the trim or the door. These pictures are a few weeks old and don’t show the finished install, but gives you an idea of the Work in progress. I can’t post current ones as I’m enameling the cabinetry at the moment. My advice to you is to keep looking and doing research for a barn door solution that works for you, if that is what you want. We scheduled our handy man to come out and install the doors, but he is booked out til August. So my husband and I hung them ourselves a few weeks ago

((work in progress- you can see in the pic the electrical switches on the wall. In this case the door trim gives us enough clearance to slide over them. I found that I can put a 1/2” thick painting to the right of the doors. I place the white cabinet a few inches from the wall, in front of the left door As I needed the space and makes use of the wall. The left door is able to snuggly slide behind it. ))

It took several hours, but w patience and lots of double checking math, it worked for us.