When our architect was able to fit a pantry into our kitchen renovation plans, I was over the moon with excitement. Like everything else happening in our home, I had already imagined having a pantry in my head and what I would do with it. In my head, it had an antique door as the entrance. So, I started looking and found one on Craigslist. It was located in a barn, and the ad said to bring help because it was very heavy; I enlisted the help of my son, and we picked it up.
This is what she looked like when I bought her off Craigslist. She had been sitting in an old barn for years. At this point, I should have taken notice of all the red flags screaming at me to not buy this piece, but my heart won out and I brought it home.
Was I sorry? Let's see what I did, and you be the judge.
The first thing I did was test to make sure the paint was not lead. Once I knew it was not, I started stripping and scraping for what seemed like days. Oh wait, it was days. The reason it was taking so long is because it had multiple layers of paint. No matter how hard I tried, I was unable to get all the layers of paint off, which left an uneven surface not suitable for painting. I was ready to give up (actually, I was ready to throw it in the road and run over it). My husband saw my frustration and volunteered to sand the rest of the paint off for me. What a great guy!
Even though I had taken layers of paint off it still took an additional two days to get down to the wood. Did I mention I love my husband!
Next up filling in the holes left by the lock.
I cut out a circular piece of wood to fill the space left by the lock, then made a template to use for cutting wood for the hole where the latch was, then secured both with wood glue. Once the glue dried, I filled any gaps with spackle. It took two applications to get and even surface.
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Keep a lookout for "Pantry Door Part Two: The Reveal!"
It was time to fill the holes.
It was all patched up, but it still needed a little something.
I added molding to the panels on the bottom of the door.
And also to the glass panels at the top of the door.
When I first started the door, I was not sure if I would paint it or stain it. With all the repair work that it needed, I had to paint it.
To help me choose a color, I took my drapery fabric and a picture of the dining room chair fabric as references.
I ended up choosing “Starless Night” from Behr in an eggshell finish.
I primed and painted.
Took off the old hardware.
I replaced it with antique hardware I found at Rehouse Salvage in Rochester, N.Y.
I also wanted to do something special to the glass windows on the door. Not only to hide the pantry contents, but some of the glass was scratched. I thought of frosting the glass or using a mirror effect spray paint. Either would have been beautiful, but I wanted to tie in the antique hardware somehow. I remembered seeing some kind of grating at Home Depot. It comes in a variety of metals, including brass and gold.
This definitely did the trick!
After measuring I got my trusty metal cutter snips out.
Cutting was easy. It was the sharp edges I needed to watch out for.
The first piece was cut and ready to be put in window.
This is how it looked.
The finished door!
Love the combination of the metal grating and the door hardware!
It was a long process, but worth the end result!
Addition updates: This week was probably the most chaotic it has been in the house since the project started. We had people working most everyday, but Wednesday and Thursday were unbelievable. There were about fifteen people working in the house at the same time. The electrician, plumber, HVAC, window people and framers each had there own team. Managing all this was our contractor, Vinny Orologio of V.J Construction. It was truly amazing to watch! Everyone did what needed to be done very efficiently.
This was the street in front of our house with all the workers’ trucks parked.
This is just a little bit of what was going on.
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