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22 May 2013

PUTTING THE MODERN BACK IN OUR MID CENTURY RANCH: ENTRY

As the weather has really started to warm up, I find my attention shifting to the outdoors again.  Maybe it's because I spend so much time out there with Little Pilot and Co-pilot.  Today, I want to share with you some of the updates we have done to the front of our house since we moved in and some ideas I have for modernizing our front entry.
Our front door and exterior has been a slowly improving over the last couple of summers.  We've made some progress, but there's still lots to do!  Here's the earliest before photo of our house I could find.  

We had already taken down the shutters and the sunrise mullions off the garage windows, but it still has the old roof, walkway, blue door and broken white screen door (it's open so it's hard to see).

During our first summer here we replaced the roof and stripped our front door of 5 coats of paint:  blue then red then mint (kind of fun to find mint under all the layers!) then yellow then white.  We then stained the door in a dark walnut colour.  This stripping and staining process took several days and Tech Guy kept having to take the door off the hinges and then put it back at night - a pretty big pain!  The neighbours were probably wondering why our front door was a bubbling, multi-coloured mess. :)

Here's a picture of the front door with the walnut stain and a new screen door.  Still has the old walkway though and the very traditional lantern and house numbers.  When it's time to replace the windows I'd love to go with ones with darker frames and ditch the mullions.

We did replace the walkway last year and removed the spruce and yew bushes that were oddly placed by the front door.  Here's a peak at the new walkway stairs (or just an excuse to put a picture of Little Pilot in this post).

So now that you're up to date with all of our exterior improvements thus far, here's what's going on now:  
The landscaping is on hold at the moment as we will be replacing the weeping tile and waterproofing in  the next month or so, but I really should be planning that too.  The front door will not be affected by our weeping tile work so I am trying to spruce it up a bit and make it a little more modern like the rest of our decor.  I'm thinking of something pretty minimal such as these inspiration photos that I've pinned.

Love this clean entry with a little pop of colour.


This one is also fun and I love the mailbox and numbers on it.

Here's another option for numbers on a wood wall.

To organize my ideas a little better I made a mood board that reflects the items we already have and some that I'm thinking of getting:



1.  This is approximately the colour of our front door and it is pretty traditional, but I'm hoping it will still look okay to mix it up with some more modern elements
2.  This is the grip set we have right now.  It was from Lowe's and has worked pretty well so far.
3.  Tech Guy really loves this style of light (from here).
4.  I have wanted this mailbox for about 2 years now.  It's made in Finland, but they only sell the black and stainless option here in Canada.  I really would like a colourful one.  I may have to order it from the States-side.
5.  This knocker matches our grip set.  I haven't decided if I will add one to our door or not, but I like that this one is pretty clean and simple.
6.  I'd love to have a colourful door mat and have been loving this DIY wood mat for awhile now.
7.  New planters would be nice.  These ones are from Ikea.  I'm thinking of putting a larger and smaller one together.
8.  This arrangement is similar to what I like to do with my flowers.  Something tall (Canna Lilly), bright small flowers (Lantana) and something that drapes down (love Creeping Jenny with the bright green leaves).
9.  Modern house numbers.  These are an affordable option.  *image from here

Lots of brushed nickel/stainless steel!  I'm hoping to add interest with a bit of colour.  Now I just have track down a mailbox!


17 comments:

  1. ooh, I really love those stone steps (and of course your model on them ;)). And that mailbox is so fun....I feel kind of cheated now by our out by the street one!

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    1. We used to have to get our mail by the street as well, but here the mailman brings it to the door which is nice. I don't think he likes our current mailbox though. It's so narrow and the mail almost never fits inside.

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  2. I showed the pictures of your front steps to my landscaper husband and he was drooling. They are gorgeous. I love huge stone steps like that. The details you are planning for your entryway are so cool! I can't wait to see it all come together!

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  3. I, too, love those stone steps. And your mood board. Love all the elements you have pulled together. Model=cute!

    So envious that you get your mail all the way to the door. Do you have the mailman over for coffee and gossip too? :) That would be so awesome ha ha!

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    1. ha ha! :) We do talk to the mailman once in awhile and he's one of Nalle's (our dog) best friends, but haven't had him over for coffee though!

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  4. Love all the ideas! Can't wait to see what you do. I have a very similar style house. I just pained the door a dark charcoal gray. I want to do mailbox and house numbers next.

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    1. Thanks Julie. I am wanting to paint our back door a charcoal colour as well.

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  5. love love all the bright colors! such great curb appeal:)

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  6. Fabulous inspiration - can't wait to see what you do!!

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  7. hmmm... i'll come throw a rock at your windows if you come throw one at ours... ;)

    we have the lowes house numbers... ha! i bought them along with our mailbox right when we moved in as a 'welcome home' present to ourselves ;) they of course didn't actually get used until last summer (two years later!)... an idea for a cheaper mailbox option is the 'post' one here... we have it in red... it would be easy to spray paint another colour... http://www.mossgardenhome.ca/homegarden/mailboxes/index.html

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    1. Haha! Thanks for the tip on the mailbox. I'll show it to Tech Guy for sure.

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  8. Your home is stunning. Love all of your ideas, can't wait to see more. I would love for you to link up to my Inspire Me party at - -http://www.astrollthrulife.net/2013/05/166th-inspire-me-tuesday.html. Hope to see you there. Hugs, Marty

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  9. Hi - I found your front door mood board on Pinterest and loved it. I featured it in a post I just did on my blog about the best front doors in the blogosphere here:
    http://www.marshallhousematters.com/2013/05/front-door-awards.html

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  10. I was so glad to see this (and see that you blogged about it!) We are getting ready to refinish our mid century door and replace our storm door this week (or remove it completely) what did you decide to do? xo julia (tagandtibby)

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    1. We haven't replaced the door yet. We added a darker storm door since it works really well for ventilation with the screen option in the summer. We will have to replace the front door at some point when we end up changing all the windows on the house as well. I did end up getting the blue gobi mailbox and some new numbers in the meantime: http://www.nalleshouse.com/2013/08/weve-got-mailbox.html

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  11. Where did you get the screen door from? I love its simple and modern look.

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    1. Hi! The screen door is by Andersen. We ordered it through the Home Depot.

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