My goal with this door project was simple:
Make it look old.
Note: Since I have so many pictures of this project overall, I decided to make this post (part one) about the elements I added, and close up images of the completed door. Part two (coming very soon) will be about the painting/distressing techniques, along with images to help explain them.
With the front panel already added, I started to visualize what this door could look like.
Along with “old world style” requests were made for:
1. antique/industrial elements
2. little bit of french influence
3. layers of metal and wood details
4. carved detail
5. mis-matched add ons
6. gritty, grungy, dirty, and aging gray-ish paint.
Let’s take a look…
Starting at the top, this curved detail piece had broken off a little shelf I had in my garage.
(See? I don’t keep broken things for no reason. Ha ha!)
(My husband’s not laughing.)
(OK, I MAY have a bit of a situation out there…)
I attached it with Gorilla Glue, and nails.
Barn wood scraps leftovers and giant furniture tack looking thingys.
(Found at my local Habitat ReStore.)
I added three metal tiles to the front, three to the back, and cut a hole in the center one and added some screen.
Note: These very authentic looking tiles were given to me by a friend a couple years ago. They were found as shown, in an antique shop, with the diamond shape already cut out. I did not alter them in any way. (I could not have even come close to making those metal tiles look that awesome.)
Keeping along with the idea of mis-matching hardware add ons, I found a hook lock, a knob with a random floral backplate, and a random wood detail piece.
And, a random handle on a random piece of wood.
Moving down the very tall door, I mounted an empty square frame, with a random square detail piece in the center.
At the bottom, I mounted a wooden box lid.
And, just because I like this close up…
A full view…
Some views from behind:
Just in case someone needs a bottle opener…
Installed Picture
See techniques used Layering and Texturing, Distressing here
Paint Technique | Texture And Layering
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Paint Technique | Texture And Layering
Life is like a good paint technique.
It gets messy, multi-layered, and it evolves as you go.
My paint technique consists of a few core rules, but keep in mind these are my so-called “rules” for distressed paint jobs only. Not your nice, clean, perfectly-smooth-as-glass, paint jobs.
And as always, my RULES are subject to change if I find a better way, or if I find out I didn’t know everything and… hey!- who do I think I am making up rules anyway…
1.) I use up what I’ve got, and I mix my own paint. (You might be surprised at what goopy, colors-mixed-together, paint can do.)
2.) What is “Annie Sloan Chalk Paint”? (I couldn’t tell you anything about it, because I’ve never used it. I sure do see a lot of people talking about it though… it’s even got an official acronym: ASCP. The truth is, 99% of the paint I buy is from the “oops” paint section at Home Depot, Lowe’s, or Habitat Restore. If I want “chalk paint”, I just mix some plaster of paris, water and paint, and ta-da! Chalk Paint. Better yet, MCVOCP. (mycheapversionofchalkpaint….chalk paint)
3.) More often than not, I don’t use a paint brush. I will use whatever’s within arms reach: stir stick, paper towel, my fingers…. Since I use a scraper to spread the paint 9 times out of 10, I really just need something to get a glob of paint onto my surface. After that, I use a flexible scraper, putty knife, or anything with a straight edge to spread the paint around. (No brush marks!)
First thing’s first.
I stained the door to tone down the obvious “new-ness”.
I did the front and back, so it took a few days to fully dry before I could paint over the stain.
Next up, putting on the paint/texture/age.
(We eat a lot of cottage cheese.)
I do have an issue with my husband throwing away cottage cheese containers. They have so much repurposing potential! (However, I could only tell you about the potential they have to hold my paint concoctions.)
Getting to it.
When I am painting something to look old, (like a door) I think about all the things that might happen to a door over time.
For example: Layers of paint and layers of texture. Old paint layers weren’t always smooth so…
I started with a very clumpy chalk paint layer, using a bendy scraper to flatten it down and spread the mess.
This paint was pretty dry. There is more plaster of paris in this coat of paint. I wanted it thick. I also left some bumpy texture in random places.
I added an unimportant amount of plaster of paris to the gray paint as well, and schlapped/spread some gray over the white.
Then, because I wanted even more layers, I repeated layering. I feel like age, equals layers. hmm…
Between layers when the paint was almost dry, I scraped some sections and reapplied the excess right back in place. This left a more raised area of texture.
I want to mention at this point, that I concentrated the extra texture toward the bottom of the door. I felt like this was the area that a door was most likely to get beat up through the years.
I should also point out that with the exception of the panel that came attached to the front, this was a relatively new door. (Found at Habitat Restore.) The “aged” look I wanted to achieve, had to be made with more paint left on the piece than I normally would like. I prefer to work with older wood, which makes for realistic distressing. In those situations, the wood left exposed after any distressing is actual old wood. With this door, I couldn’t let too much of the newer looking surface underneath show through and give me away. If I had removed too much paint, it wouldn’t look like an old door. It would actually end up looking like old paint, on a new door.
Elmer’s glue trick.
Well, actually, I used both Elmer’s glue and dollar store white glue. I didn’t notice a difference in the application or the outcome.
This is how I did it:
I spray painted some areas with some black paint. (And then waited a few minutes until it was dry to the touch.)
Then, I applied white glue over the black paint areas. (The thicker it’s spread, the wider the cracks.)
After waiting a few more minutes, the glue was just dry enough (but still tacky) that I could apply paint over it without pulling up any of the glue on my brush. (Yes, I used a paint brush for this part.)
The magic behind this trick is the different drying times between the paint and glue.
That’s wraps up the put the paint on portion of this project.
Part Two: taking some off (distressing methods) is under the techniques category
Distressing Technique | Paint Finish
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Distressing Technique | Paint Finish
I use the word “distress” loosely
It’s one of those blanket terms for “scrape, scratch, hurt, dent, damage, chip” when referring to paint…. you get the idea.
So, when I was dividing up all the steps involved on my door transformation, I knew the distressing part would need to be it’s own post.
(Is that some kind of pun?)
After all, There is more than one way to distress a door.
1. Scraping.
I use a cabinet scraper. I think it’s actually a replacement blade for a cabinet scraper-thingy-tool. (I sound smart.)
I like to scrape while the paint is still barely wet, changing up how hard I press while scraping.
2. Using paint stripper.
“What the….” Yes. I know. But it breaks the paint down and sort of “melts” it, giving me another way to vary the appearance of the paint. (Remember, I wanted to make this door look like it had lived quite a few years, and seen quite a few different elements.)
*Note: I distressed the paint at different times during this project, both before the application of an oil based glaze, and after. Hence, the sudden darker paint in the pics.
(Details on glazing technique will be in the next post.)
(This is where I tell you I used a respirator, but not gloves while using this product. I always regret not using gloves. I always think I can use it without letting it touch my skin. I fail every time. These chemicals will find a way to touch your skin! You should always wear gloves.)
I spray random areas and let it sit for a minute or two…
Then I use a paper towel to rub it around a little…
Then I used my trusty scraper.
I like how the paint bubbled up in some areas, so I actually left some stripper there on the paint, to dry.
Next, I re-applied glaze over the areas I used stripper on. (Glazing step will be in the next post)
I concentrated this look to the bottom portion of the door, where the most wear and tear would most likely be.
3.) Sanding.
Using sandpaper to distress paint is kind of a strange area for me. I go back and forth a lot. There was a time when my sander was my weapon of choice, but all of my finishes started to look the same: sanded. Sometimes it seems too uniform for my eyes. Like when the edges of a furniture piece are all sanded and you get that all too uniform “worn” look. Or when the “worn” look is a little too obviously random, like maybe the sander was playing twister on said furniture piece.
For me, it’s about randomness holding hands with expected wear pattern, and then chaperoned by varying methods of distress. (Not just a sander.)
Having said that, I chose to only do some sanding by hand at the very end of this project, to pop out some of the white clumps from the base layer of chalk paint. Remember the bumpy texture I made in the very first painting step? (see previous post on paint technique)
And I scraped off some of the bigger clumps as a finishing touch too.
Ta-da!
One last detail….
I thought about any details I added to this door, that would create additional distressing of it’s own, over time. Like, this dangling, swinging, hook. Yeah, It would probably do something like this:
To view other techniques used, please go to the techniques category on the blog.
Glaze | Stain | Antiquing Technique
Glaze | Stain | Antiquing Technique
You can tell a lot about an object, by it’s patina.
When I’ve got to fake a patina on a painted surface, I use any variation of these 3 things:
*oil-based stain
*oil-based glaze
*dirt (no, really.)
First of all, I’ll talk about stain.
(Keep in mind that I save these antiquing techniques until very last. Meaning.. I usually distress the paint first.)
Using stain over paint is tricky sometimes, because if you apply it to chalk paint or flat paint, it’s going to soak right in and be pretty dark (whereas, a semi-gloss paint isn’t going to absorb that much.)
In my example pictured below, I wanted to add some really dark stain around the detail pieces.
I concentrated on areas I felt would “collect” the most patina over time.
This next picture shows using stain to create a “shadow” from an add-on piece.
And because anything metal seems to “bleed” into the wood over time, I did this:
It looks pretty dark, I know. But next I apply glaze over all the surface and it balances it out.
Now for the 2nd “thing” I use: Glaze.
I use a small brush to smear glaze into all the corners and crevices.
I have found that I get a better result if I over-apply, and wipe off.
Also, if I feel like not enough glaze wiped off, I wipe with a mineral spirits soaked rag.
Over-application, then wiping, will ensure that all the little details and crevices get filled with glaze.
When glazing a surface that’s textured, (like my example in the pictures) it’s good to apply/wipe in all directions too.
I cover every bit of surface with the glaze.
(Full coverage will help avoid the awful streaks.)
I like to wipe off immediately with clean paper towels…
And that’s it!
Oh, I almost forgot to talk about the 3rd thing I use to add a patina…
Dirt!
Seriously.
I’ll save that for another time. 
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