Keep Your Eyes Open

Our upstairs had all matching doors except the one in the bathroom was missing.  All of the doors on our main floor were gone so we didn't know where we would find a matching door for the bathroom.  We looked in salvage and antique stores in Utah and Denver but couldn't find a match.  Our neighbors who are also restoring a Victorian built the same year as our's had matching doors but didn't have any to spare.  So for several years a sheet served as the door to our bathroom.

Many holes and latch area almost gone

Even worse on the other side

Filled the holes and reversed the door

7 layers of paint

Hours and hours of stripping and sanding

After weeks finally looking good

No more hanging sheets for privacy

Thanks to Ebay and Lowe's

However one day as my wife was driving past an antique store she thought she saw a door similar to what we needed leaning against the wall of the store.  She pulled a u-turn and after examining the door decided it was a match.  I agreed and bought it the next day after getting the price down to $30 which I felt was a good deal as in our area antique doors often sell for $100 of more.  As the pictures show it required some extensive rebuilding and refinishing.  I reversed the hinges so the rotted hole from the knob would be out-of-play and I would have solid wood for the new (old) knob.  We purchased matching antique glass knobs and faceplates on ebay for all the upstairs doors and Lowe's sells replicas of the old style mortise locksets.

One of the delights of old homes is seeing something of your's somewhere else.  One evening we were watching an old Henry Fonda western "My Darling Clementine" and we noticed the hotel where much of the movie took place had doors that are the exact match of the ones in our home.  So if you want to see our doors rent the movie.