Living room door

With a project this size its important to have small goals, while keeping an eye on the big picture of course. The major work we’d like done has to wait until finances allow, so there’s a limit to how much decorating it’s worth doing – not so much that it has to be done all over again after the builders/gas fitter/electrician have done their bits, but enough to make the place nice to live in right now.

One such small job is the living room door. This is one that drew my attention from the moment I viewed the flat – the paint appeared to be peeling off in a kind of ‘craquelure’ effect, for whatever reason (poor prep? wrong paint?)

Once I started stripping the door, several other layers were revealed, the most tenacious of which was a very smooth, almost bakelite-effect black. I confess my technique was a bit rough, but the process was therapeutic. But it was hard on the wrist and we couldn’t decide what colour we were going to have the doors, so progress was slow.

Eventually we decided to paint the hall-side of the door in Pointing, the Farrow & Ball shade we’re having for the majority of the paintwork. With a mostly black door to cover, this meant two layers of undercoat to being with…

… followed by three coats of Pointing:

From the above photo you get a sneak preview of the colour we chose (well, it was me really!) for the inside of the door – a lovely Farrow & Ball orange called Charlotte’s Locks…

We think this looks pretty lush with Light Gray walls… the only decision to be made now is whether to paint the door frame in Light Gray also. My feeling is we must, but Nick isn’t so sure…