DIY Chippy Painted Doors

Hi there!

I’m excited to share a little side project I finished! I had been going back and forth on whether or not I wanted to strip or paint all our interior doors and I then found the answer somewhere in between 🙂 I have long loved all things with a beautiful patina of wear and love. So let’s talk about DIY chippy painted doors!

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Old Doors

There weren’t a lot of the original interior doors still intact when we bought the farmhouse. But because there are a few I’ll be able to track some down that are the same style. My guess is that they were removed to create a more open feel downstairs, but eventually I’d like to add them all back.

This door pictured above is one of them. It was actually in the barn, but fits the living room doorways. Since one of the living room doorways has been walled over when the previous owner extended the bathroom I decided to put it there. Luckily when they did this they didn’t remove the door frame and properly wall it in. Instead they simply added a sheet of bead board in the doorway and left the original moldings on this side of the wall.

I say luckily because we do plan on relocating that bathroom and opening the original floor plan. However, in the meantime I felt this was the perfect place to put this door so that it would at least make it look a bit better. Now instead of seeing a doorway with a random bead board wall behind it, it will just be a door that leads to nowhere lol!

Sanding the Door

Part of me really wanted to reveal the natural wood like I had done on our front door.

You can see how I refinished our front door HERE!

But to be honest it’s a ton of work to sand and strip a door completely. Even our front door still has a few small paint spots in holes and crevices, which I actually really love! Then when it came time to refinish our bedroom door I was still undecided and went ahead and gave it a quick coat of paint, which I quickly regretted and will be redoing.

Chippy Doors

So when I decided to work on this door I decided it would be the one where I would experiment and figure out a look I was really happy with and would continue through the rest of the house. So I started sanding. You can see in the picture above where I had sanded and then stopped because along the way I fell in love with the idea of our interior doors landing somewhere in between painted and natural wood. The best of both worlds, and a look that feels so appropriate for our fixer upper farmhouse style 😉

I got some Milk Paint by Fusion to create a chippy look and had planned on layering it here and there, then sanding and repeating until I achieved what I had in mind.

But that ended up being completely unnecessary! There were so many gorgeous layers already waiting to be uncovered it was just a matter of deciding how much I would leave. I sanded until content and LOVE how it turned out!

Unique Doors

I chose to sand this door quite a bit. But another thing I love about this concept is that each door I do will be different and unique. Some will have more paint that others. I did not seal this door with anything yet because I still need to do the other side of it. I’ll let you know what I use when I do the upstairs doors.

I’m linking the sander I used HERE and for the main larger parts of the door. It made quick work of the paint layers with an 80 grit sandpaper. I highly recommend it! 

I’m linking the detail sander I used to get into the smaller areas HERE! Again it worked SO well! 

You can also see and click on the shoppable photos just below this post!

Another Door Revelation

Something else that has bothered me since we moved in is the transom window above this exterior door in the living room. This door is technically the front door of the house, but currently isn’t functional because of the flooring height. The door will have to be cut down eventually so it can open. We’ll do that will be after we rebuild the original front porch which has fallen off.

The window had been painted over on the inside. I scraped the paint to reveal a black window because it was covered with wood on the outside. I removed the wood and was shocked to find this beautiful blue stained glass! So special for the front door!

We’ll also be replacing all the missing transom windows!

Two Front Doors

That door is also an exact match to the one we found in the barn and installed in the kitchen as our “front door”. I’ll be stripping this one completely just like the other! The reason there were two identical doors is because there were 2 front doors off of the porch that is now gone. However, again when the previous owner extended that bathroom they closed off the second door.

Technically this room, which we use as a living room would have been the dining room. And the other room the second front door led to was the sitting room, which is now half a bathroom and half my office. Once the sunroom is done it will be our living room and this room will again be the dining room. Whether or not we’ll be re-opening the second front door will be determined when we relocate the bathroom.

DIY Chippy Painted Doors

I’m sure that’s all probably about as clear as mud! Lol! But I promise it will make sense as we go along! Also I know these DIY chippy painted doors door won’t be for everyone and that’s okay! But I happen to LOVE them and I can’t wait to do the other doors! Also isn’t that blue just the happiest surprise?! Have you ever uncovered something special in your home?

Thanks so much for stopping by the blog today!