This is the EWN Podcast Network. Today on From Disaster to Dream Home, we will be talking about doors, doors, everywhere are doors with Lynette McNeil of Coast Doors and Hardware. Lynette will help us understand the varied options available to us when selecting the interior doors for our new home.

Welcome to From Disaster to Dream Home, the podcast that takes you inside the home building and rebuilding process. When interior designer, Jana Rosenblatt, had an 80 foot tree fall in her house, she saw the opportunity to create the customized home of her dreams. From Disaster to Dream Home provides you with the information and resources Jana wished she had during her rebuilding process. Now she's sharing with you the expertise of leading architects and home builders and the newest products and materials on the market. Here's your host, Jana Rosenblatt.

Usually, the windows have been purchased, delivered, and installed before you need to worry about the installation of interior doors. But they should be considered early as they will be a big part of the interior design style of the house. Depending on the product and material selections you make, they will take a while to receive, but they will not be installed until nearly the end of the building process. Hi, Lynette. Thanks for sticking around to talk, on this second episode about doors doors.

Everywhere there are doors. Seriously,

a lot

of doors. When the client first comes in, how will you begin to approach the huge field of interior door options?

We start by understanding the overall design look, the end look that the customer is going for. We then go into detail about each opening and where it's leading, whether it's a bedroom, a bathroom, a pantry, a laundry room, the garage, the door that leads from the garage to the house. Even this is interior doors, but even their front door because the front door does add to how we design and pick out the interior doors. We like everything to kind of complement each other.

So there's a door count indicated and indicating the placement and the size of all the doors on every set of plans that's been approved, you know, to be able to start construction. Often, that's all we know when we start shopping except we have the architect's rendering that will help identify the style of the house. How do you begin the conversation about style and function?

We we talk directly with the homeowners most of the time when it comes to the interiors. The builder is involved sometimes, but because this is the inside of their home, this is what they're gonna see every day. This to me is a little bit more on a personal level that needs to be discussed with the owners. And we sit down and we show them different samples, and we have just doors on display, some that are finished, whether they're painted or stained so they can get an idea of, oh, okay. That looks good in a stained finish or, oh, no.

I wanna do a painted door or, you know, the thickness of the door panels or how wide the styles and rails are on a door so we can make sure certain hardware fit fits on that door. So there's a lot, actually, that goes into picking out interior doors that people don't think about. So that's where we start that process to really get an idea of what the feeling that the client wants in that inside their home. And that even also is how the door functions

Uh-huh.

How it closes, how it latches, the feeling of the door. Do they you know, we wanna make sure it's not too flimsy or too thin or light. So that way when they close the door, they feel that nice latching when the door hardware clicks together, and that that's very important to clients right now.

And so what are the primary kinds of doors that we have to choose from in terms of solid, solid core molded doors? What are some of those variations?

So there are solid core and hollow core slab or flush doors. What that means is that they are flat. There are no designs. They are simply just a flat piece of wood, and they are actually, particle board inside. So you have a skin that is put on the door and inside are particle board.

These doors have been actually coming back very popular lately because a lot of people want a very simple modern look.

The contemporary clean.

The very contemporary sleek door. Now you can also take that flush door, and we're seeing a lot of this as well where there's a little v groove line that's put in the door, whether you go in horizontal or vertically and sometimes both, which just adds just a little bit of a of a decoration to the door, but there's still no panel. Mhmm. This is a very modern look as well. Then we have molded doors.

Molded doors are doors that are they're basically a mold. So, again, they're particle bore infused, and they come in solid and hollow core. Again, particle board inside, but they have a mold or a large stamp that when they go through the process of be in production, they're actually a big stamp comes down and and stamps the mold to make the panel design. So there's, you know, there's a there's a two panel, there's a three panel, there's a five panel, a six panel. Some are raised.

And now we have a lot of flat panel molded doors as well now. Again, those are very simple doors. They're they're not as inexpensive as they used to be with all the price changes we're having, but they're still nice looking doors and they're affordable.

Are the molded doors always gonna come primed? They're always gonna be a paint product?

Yes. The molded doors are always a paint grade product. You cannot get a molded door in a stain grade product. The only way you can do a stain grade door is if you go into a style and rail solid wood door.

Right. Which is probably pricey.

It depends. It depends on the wood species. So the next type of door that we're seeing a ton of right now are style and rail shaker doors, which is everywhere. Yeah. So style and rail shaker doors are wood doors.

Uh-huh.

But they have a a one, a two, a three, a five panel design that has a true style and rail, but a flat panel in the center. Those come in different thicknesses and, you know, different widths.

Mhmm.

Those are very popular. And right now, believe it or not, you can actually get a shaker door for the same price as you can the molded door. And in my opinion popular? Yep. And in my opinion, the shaker door by far is a better investment.

It's just a more solid door. It's not particle board. And then you can also do MDF doors. MDF doors, they're medium density fiberboard. They're heavy.

Uh-huh. And you can get those in a wide variety of sizes, styles, panel designs, and it is those are made to order. So those do take longer to get. Mhmm. But those you can get whether you want shaker or raised panel.

But those only come solid. Medium density fiberboard doors are only solid and they're only paint grade.

So now you mentioned that they were heavier. So what are the best so doors have so many different functions. We need some that are gonna be sound buffering and add privacy, then some are going to just be for privacy and and the sound buffering like a laundry room door. Actually, that's not a good example. I guess they all need some sound buffering, but, like, closet doors will need less sound buffering and things like that.

So can you mix and match the door selection and what is gonna give you the best sound buffering? And can you match that to less expensive doors where you don't need the sound issue?

Absolutely. Yes. Absolutely. So and we do. We walk people through this process by letting them know, Especially if they say, hey.

I'm on a budget and I really need but I really wanna make my master bedroom door stand out or I really want that to be the most sound proof not proof, but sound deadening because I've got kids. And I I want, you know, I wanna be able to shut everybody out at the end of the night, not hear anything. So yeah. So what we do is we help them. Normally, the solid doors, whether that be solid core or MDF or even wood, we will put those on the bedrooms and bathrooms, the laundry room.

The garage to house has to be solid no matter what because it's fire rated. And then, yes, we help them by putting the little bit thinner doors or the thinner panels or even the hollow doors on places like the closets and the you know, like your coat closet or even a bedroom closet to where you don't need to spend a lot of extra money on those particular doors when you wanna put the nicer, heavier doors in the areas that matter the most.

And how does the kind of door affect the price?

It does affect the price. So the molded doors and your flush doors are gonna be your least expensive.

Uh-huh.

Those are a dime a dozen. They're usually in stock. They're very quick to get. Right.

Which is a factor.

Yes. Pre COVID. During and we're starting to see things get a lot better now. So that that's kinda getting back to normal. Pre COVID, those doors would take a week to get.

And that was pre hung with a jam and hinges and done. Once COVID hit, unfortunately, supply chains went awry, and it was taking us six to eight weeks to get prehung doors, which is abnormal. Uh-huh. Now we're back to about a week to week and a half. So things are getting better in that department, and that's for the the flush doors and the molded doors.

The MDF doors are made to order because there's so many panel designs and options with MDF doors. Mhmm. No one has them just sitting around because they are a little more expensive. They're not bad, but they are more expensive, depending on the design and the because with MDF doors, you can pick everything down to the molding that goes around the doors. It's Mhmm.

There's so many different molding options that you can put around each panel and and kinda make that door a little more custom. So those right now are taking, I would say, anywhere between six to ten weeks. What unless excuse me. Depending on if you're doing book doors, which means just the door, or if you're ordering them pre hung, which means they're gonna come in the frame ready to go into the opening.

Now mostly with new construction projects, people are gonna be ordering them pre hung. Right? Because it's

gonna be safer and easier? Or Well, it depends. So

Uh-huh.

For my team, when we go into a new build, you know, into a new home, we do things a little different than other people do. We go and we we hang jams first. Uh-huh. And then we come back and hang doors later. And the reason for this is because by the time all the trades get through there Yeah.

The doors get damaged. Yes. Of course. Yeah. Especially now with as long as things are taking to get, we don't want somebody to be in a position that they're gonna have to wait Uh-huh.

To get a door a new door ordered when it was no one else's fault. You know what I mean? Like, somebody else damaged it. So we're trying to avoid that.

Yeah. So these are one of the icings of the cake for sure.

Yes. Yeah. So we swing the door at not at the end, but after the drywall is done, mudding is done. So that way that door has less of a chance of getting damaged.

Right. Yeah. And so even if they're paying you to do the especially if they're paying you to do the whole thing, you're gonna come in and get all the the framing done, go away, and then when every when the dust settles, come back in and and add the doors.

Yeah. We swing the doors. We prep for hardware. We don't put the hardware on yet, but we prep for hardware. So when we swing the door, we basically dap for the hinges.

We swing them on the frames, make sure everything's level and plumb, and then we also prep for the hardware, and then we leave. And then at the very end, when painting's done, everything's done, then we come back and we put hardware on.

Right. Now let's talk a moment about hardware before we go on to styles of doors. How do we go about choosing our hardware? There's, you know, there's knobs and levers and how soon. Is that something we decide after we choose the door style, or do people have feelings about that from the beginning?

You know, I have been it it depends on the thought process of the owner. If they're raring to go and they just wanna get it done, as soon as they pick the door out, I'm showing them hardware.

Right. Right. Right.

Just last week, I'm getting ready to start a new job and the client came in. Him and his wife came in. We went through the whole house and picked everything out. Everything's done.

Mhmm.

Now that doesn't mean that it's all ordered. Now that's on me to order it when needed. So but they picked out their windows. They picked out their interior doors. They picked out their front door.

Everything has been picked out, written down. They know what they wanted. So though they came kind of ready to go. Uh-huh. But we have people that come in that, okay.

I just wanna get my doors picked out and ordered. Mhmm.

Mhmm.

I said, okay. Here's some hardware brochures. I'm gonna let you take these with you. We'll come over. If you have questions or you wanna come back in so we can go through each item, let's do that.

Hardware doesn't take as long depending on where you order from or what vendor you want. Most of the vendors that we do carry, which we do carry quite a bit, are pretty quick. But we do have a few that can take, you know, anywhere from three to eight weeks, again, depending on the style and color, especially color right now Mhmm. That they order.

Yeah. So, usually, before we've had to make the final decisions on the door style, which then also leads to the hardware style, we have already gone through the process of designing the plumbing fixtures. And so the plumbing fixtures are really the first visual metal in the home, and that's what's going to, I think and and style wise. So I now know already if my client wants, you know, traditional kind of turn of the century looking things and versus the contemporary sleek lines, and are they square or are they round? And so those are all the kinds of choices that go into making the hardware choice, which is like the jewelry, you know, of the house.

It's the little, you know, the little pearl earrings you put on before you leave in your little black dress.

So It's funny you say that because I tell all my clients that. I tell all the hardware is the jewelry. It's the little accessory that you're adding on to kinda compliment, but you don't need to overpower it. Right. Because it is supposed to be just a subtle little like, an accessory.

Yeah. It's funny. I use that terminology a lot.

Yeah. That's good. Yeah. It's just you know, single doorknob is one thing. But, collectively, when you're in a room and you can see 12 of them from one place, you know, that collectively makes a big difference.

So from there, let's go into what the primary styles of doors are to consider with certain kinds of architecture. So I'm gonna throw out, you know, some door styles visually and and kinda give me an idea of where people are using those and where you're suggesting them. So the first is the slab door, the the flat panel, whether it I guess it matters whether it's finished wood versus painted. But where are people using those those door choices?

Very modern, where they almost especially if they're paint grade, where they almost disappear with the walls. We're doing a lot of that right now, actually. So

if they're gonna if they're painting them to disappear with the walls, are they painting the the trim, or is does that the only thing that stands the door out? Is that still contrasting white, or are they blending

You know, it depends. But right now, just in the last, you know, few months, we're doing a lot of homes where there is no trim. The frames are wrapped with the drywall to make it look like there is no frame.

Right.

And when the door closes, it's flush with the drywall. And, yes, they are painting them to match the drywall

color. And, of course, in that situation, the hardware really matters because that's all you really see. Yep. Yeah. That's a whole different dynamic, which is great.

And so then if I'm gonna use a a stain grade door, where are the places that you're seeing those? I mean, are they like it could and you can be have it country kind of knotted wood, or it can be super sophisticated. It could be Rift Oak, you know, super simple.

We're doing a lot of Rift White Oak right now. A ton of it. So when they stain, that is the most popular wood we're doing. Or I don't wanna say wood, but that is the most popular skins that we're doing right now because on a flush door, it is a skin. Yeah.

Very popular, and they're beautiful. Yeah. We even I've been doing still around the same kind of design where there is no trim and the frames are disappearing with the walls, and then you have this beautiful stained door popping out.

Yeah. Yeah.

And it's gorgeous.

Yeah. Uh-huh. I did that in one of my two in the Modern Craftsman. We had stained walnut doors. They were just absolutely beautiful.

They were actually single panel, but but they because they were so simple, the and, you know, it's because the slab door in walnut was more expensive than the single panel we chose. So the single panel, of course, is where there's a frame of several inches all around and then a a flat panel inside. Why were those well, were those walnut flat panel doors more expensive than the single panel door?

It's because of it's because of where the vendors that do flush doors buy their skins.

Oh.

So, like, for instance, I have a vendor. I don't, you know, I don't know if you want me to share their name, but I have a vendor that does a wide variety of interior doors. Uh-huh. And they just have some beautiful designs to pick. And they do any type of door in pretty much any kind of species of wood.

The more popular the wood species is, the least amount or not least, the less expensive it will be. Uh-huh. So walnut is going to be more expensive. Unfortunately, I love walnut. It's one of my favorite woods.

It's gorgeous.

I love that it's so unique and that you don't have to put anything on it but a clear coat. And it has such beautiful characteristics to it.

Yeah.

But because you don't see a lot of people purchasing walnut in anything, it's costing more.

Uh-huh.

Right now, like like, you know, two, three years ago, we weren't seeing rift white oak. Now it's everywhere. So now that rift white oak cost has come down Uh-huh. Because everybody's doing it. Same with Alder.

Alder used to be the most expensive years ago, and now because everybody does Alder, the cost is coming down.

Now the reason to use Alder is because it can well, there might be other reasons. You'll tell me. But the reason I suggest it sometimes is because it can imitate other woods in terms of the colors you can achieve. Like, you can get an alder door to look like walnut but be less expensive. Yeah?

Yes. Yes. The nice thing about the alder is that it starts off as a beautiful depending on whether you're gonna do a knotty or a clear alder or we call clear or select alder. Yeah. Select alder still will have some knots, but very small tight knots.

Uh-huh.

Clear alder is gonna be a little bit less than that as far as knots is concerned. So the and people should understand that when they're picking clear or select Aldro, you're gonna pay a little bit more of a premium for that because it is hand selected. It is hand pulled from the factories to make sure that each piece that's going on these doors

Yeah.

Are all just matching.

Yeah. Yeah.

Whereas a naughty alder, they're all just pulling randomly, and they're not looking at them because people want that inconsistency and that more naughty kind of rustic feel. Mhmm. But the one bonus about the naughty alder I've seen so many different ways is the stain. You can put a light stain on it and get one completely look different look and then put a dark stain on it. And like you said, you can make it look like walnut.

It it just depends on the finisher too. Right. You need somebody that knows what they're doing when it comes to the finish.

Mhmm. Yeah. And then the the flat panel door, the the single panel door, it, you know, very often is a paint grade, which gives you that kind of craftsman. It's good for mid century. It can kind of soften a traditional, so it's more transitional.

The paint grade is going to, you know, get its share of wear and tear over time. So when you balance that out sometimes with stained wood, that can kind of justify the price difference in the stained wood. But how are you seeing the comparison between people choosing to paint or stain?

You know, the majority, I have to say, lately, I would say maybe just even in the last you know, this year Uh-huh. In the last ten months, we've done probably more paint grade than anything. Really? Yes. The interior doors, usually, even on a home that they have like, say for instance, they choose to do their windows specifically, let's just say this couple I dealt with last week, the windows that they're doing, they're actually going to stain their windows on the inside.

Their interior doors, though, they're gonna paint.

Uh-huh.

So they're picking and choosing where to put that steam so it pops. Yeah. And then, you know, they're making their doors be a little bit less you know, a little more subtle. They're not gonna be as prominent in the house. Yeah.

They want those windows to be the main and they're gonna put some heavy molding around.

Yeah. Do they have some beautiful views?

A little bit. Not it's not huge. You know? It's not like they're looking at the beach, but they do have a beautiful property in Santa Rosa. And so they do have some views.

But I think architecturally, they're kind of in that like, were talking about earlier, that mix of modern more Mediterranean modern look. Uh-huh. So they have a little bit of everything going on, so they're trying to mix it into the house. And I think it's gonna come out really nice. But you can

Sounds beautiful.

You can stain an interior door and put paint grade casing around it, moldings around it, and it looks beautiful.

Yeah. Yeah. I did that in in the that Craftsman. It was absolutely beautiful. And then I also incorporate a lot I incorporate a lot of glass panels.

So sometimes in that house in particular and even in in in my own house, on interior doors where there isn't a major window in the room, like two of our bathrooms and the laundry room. I have a glass panel. It's it's non translucent, so it's you can't see through it, but it makes you feel like there's a window in the room and you do get the brightness from outside either from the lights or and then and then the bedrooms where I need more, you know, quiet and sound buffering are are flat panel and painted pink grade wood. Are you seeing people mix things up in that way?

Absolutely. We do a ton of it. We do pretty much most of the bedrooms are all solid doors, but then when we get to, like, either, an office Uh-huh. Or, like you said, or, a pantry or

Yeah.

Yeah. A laundry room. Sometimes a laundry room is glass. A lot of times, they do the wood doors there or a solid door there because of the sound. But we can do French doors or glass doors to tie in with your shaker look or your your raised panel look by based on the molding that we put around the door frame that can tie in with any of the other doors.

And if you put, like, a white laminate glass in it, it's actually a dual piece of glass to give you a little more sound buffering. So you could use that on the laundry room if you wanted to. We do that a lot. Then, you know, just some people want, like, a glass door, maybe a barn glass door going into, like, their master bathroom to kinda spruce that up a little bit and not make it the same as everything else. So

Mix it up.

You know, that's all the process of talking to the homeowner about really their vision of what they want in their home and what they're gonna look at every single day.

Yeah. Now let's talk about multiple panels on a door. My recent traditional modern modern traditional house that I did in Oak in Oak Park, we did a two panel door where the lower inset they were flat insets, and the lower one was a third and then two thirds, and we had some arches in the house. So we incorporated an arch in the door. So there were reasons in the house to lend themselves to multiple panels.

How are you seeing people use you know, years ago, any traditional house would have, like, a a nine panel door. I mean, a lot of small squares. How are you seeing that those designs evolve, and what are people doing with multi panel doors now?

It depends on where the doors are located. Again, I try really hard to listen to the clients and look at their plans if if they have a set of plans. Some people come in just with a list. We don't always get plans.

Ah. And do they when they come in with just a list, do they know what the style of their house is? Most times. And? Okay.

Most times. Sometimes we kinda have to help them along a little bit, and that's fine. That's our job. That's what we that's what I love to do. Yeah.

And but for instance, if you have a home where the majority of the doors are down a hallway Yeah. You don't want nine panels per door. It can get very busy looking.

Yeah.

Uh-huh. And I try to help people envision that. Now if the doors are kinda spread all over the place Uh-huh. And they're not all down one hallway, then we can kinda go a little busier and not make them so simple. Yeah.

But to be honest with you, the majority of what we're doing right now are very simple.

Yeah. Mhmm.

They're either one panel shakers, two panel shakers.

Yeah.

I what did I oh, so this vendor I was mentioning a few minutes ago who has a wide variety of designs, which I love this particular vendor because you can take a simple shaker door and they have, molding profiles that you can add to it to give it like a dimensional look, but it's still a shaker.

Yeah. That would make me very happy.

And let me tell you, it doesn't justify itself in the book. Yeah. When you see the doors come in in person, these are MDF. These are solid doors. These are not hollow doors by any means.

Uh-huh. When you see these doors in person, they are, if I can say, they're breathtaking. I and they're not these aren't, like, super expense. They're not inexpensive, but they're not super expensive either. But these these doors are really geared to more of a custom home that, you know, they're wanting to do a little bit more detail to the doors than just a normal stock door would do.

Right. And then we've talked about, you know, how tall our ceilings are getting now. So when you're deciding about the amount of panels in your door and the the the design of your door, you're now looking at a 96 inch, you know, an eight foot, you know, area in each doorway as opposed to when they were, you know, 80 inches. It's considerably different. So how has that affected the design styles and choices?

You know, it's funny because a lot of people even not even remodels. I'm seeing people the the the builders are going in and they have currently six foot eight or 80 inch tall doors, and the builders are are convincing them to change everything to seven foot.

Uh-huh.

But if they can, eight foot. But a lot of seven foot lately, the downside to that, unless you plan on ordering your doors custom Yeah.

Is that they're not in stock.

They are not in stock in seven foot tall. They are in six eight and they are in eight o. But the seven o but now that it's like, we were talking about the door, wood species, I think now that it's becoming more popular to do seven, I think the vendors are gonna start to catch on that, hey. We're seeing a lot of orders for seven foot tall doors all of a sudden. Maybe we should start making that a little bit more available.

Maybe not stocking as many, but at least considering that I'm doing a ton of seven foot lately. It's so weird because it's only four inches taller than a six eight, but it still makes the difference.

Yeah. Absolutely. It's it's the perception. That little bit does add lift, and it kind of Yep. Up the height of a of a not so tall room.

And so since we're building new ones that are so tall, it is a way to kind of

Right.

The renovation. But, you know, you're you're making a major investment in changing the the header and the structure.

Absolutely. So we wanna make sure we can have a wide variety for them to pick from so that way they feel that, okay. If I'm gonna put the money in to move the header, reframe the opening to a taller door, I wanna make sure I get something I really like for all this extra cost.

Mhmm.

So not everybody can do an eight foot tall. You know, maybe their ceilings are only nines and eights are just gonna be just a little too much. They go down to a seven, but they're taller than a six eight. And it it does. It elongates it a little bit more to make it feel more grand.

And how much more time do we need to leave to to get that product?

It depends on what they pick. Uh-huh. If they're doing a solid wood door that we have to order anyway, doesn't matter. It's six you're gonna look at probably anywhere between six to ten weeks. Okay.

A shaker door, some of my vendors have already caught on, and the some of the shakers are in stock now

Uh-huh.

In seven foot. So it just depends on what the client wants. But those are very simple doors. Those have no detail at all. So if they want a shaker or a flat panel door, but they want a little detail, that's gonna take you over kind of to a more custom lead time.

Mhmm. And then how is the material selection and the style you know, how is all all of the choices we're making going to affect the cost of the door?

The design is definitely going to to set apart the costs because the more simple doors, the more the doors that are in stock are less money because they're sitting on a shelf. They're ready to go. Now mind you, if they're being pre hung, the doors are in are sitting on a on a a pallet. They pull them. They have to swing them and and prep them for the prehanging.

But anything with any detail to them that's a little different than a standard door is gonna cost a little bit more, and it's gonna take more time.

And how about the differences between a natural wood door because you're gonna stain it versus the paint grade price wise? Is paint grade always gonna be less or not? Yes. Oh, okay. Yeah.

Paint grade is usually less because they're using paint grade materials. So some companies use so for instance, you can get a you can get a paint grade, door that's in stock at some of these vendors that are pre primed, but they're not using solid they're I don't wanna say they're not using solid woods. They're using, like, a paint grade pine, which is a softer wood, and it's less expensive versus doing the same exact door but in Doug fir. So that Doug fir door is gonna cost you a little bit more Mhmm. Because you're using a harder wood.

It's a little bit, you're not always gonna get that primed either. So you have to also take that into account. If you're gonna paint the little bit nicer wood door, you're gonna have to pay the extra cost to have it primed and then painted.

And then the quality that you're paying for, is it is that paint grade wood gonna be denser in terms of noise reduction, or what are would the pros be to pay to paying more? Any advantage?

Right. So if you if you're pulling a door from stock and it's not something you've custom ordered, you're going it's gonna be a little bit less quality. It's not as heavy. So for instance, I'll just take a shaker door because it's the most it's the easiest to talk about.

Yeah.

A shaker door off the shelf, inch and three eighths thick door, which is a very common thickness of door to use in interior doors, which we're seeing less of these days. A lot of people are going to inch and three quarter thick to give them a little bit more weight, but, they're stopped with a three eighths of an inch thick flat panel, which is very thin.

Mhmm.

So that door is gonna feel a little thinner, a little lighter, a little, I don't wanna say flimsy because it's not flimsy by any means. Mhmm. But it's gonna feel a little lighter.

Substantial.

Yes. So then but when you go into a thicker door, like an inch and three quarter thick door

Uh-huh.

That panel goes from a three eighths thick to a half inch thick.

Well, yeah.

It's not a lot, but it is a little bit. But if you were to turn around and order that door special, even and don't get me wrong when I say special. Special doesn't always mean a ton more money. It means it's gonna take longer. Okay.

But if you order an inch and three quarter thick door from, like, an one of my MDF vendors, that now panel goes from a half inch to 11 sixteenths.

Uh-huh.

So that's a nice heavier feeling door. You can knock on that panel, and it's not gonna sound like hollow feeling. It's gonna sound more sound deadening a little thicker.

So that

way when that door closes Yeah. It latches beautifully, and it's not, like, flopping around in a sense.

Right. Right. And so then in terms of regional preferences and needs, you work with properties that are near to the ocean and properties that are further inland. Does that make a big difference in the materials that we choose in terms of of humidity or or dryness or cold or heat? How does that affect the choices on our interior doors?

It doesn't affect them as long as we know where their house is. We have to be very careful with MDF at the beach.

Uh-huh.

Even though the doors are inside yes. Even though the doors are inside the house Right. They still be affected by the by the the the moisture in the air. So we have to be very careful. So most of the companies that sell MDF doors have what we call an exterior glue option.

Uh-huh.

And what that means is is that door, even though it's being used inside the house, we're going to protect that homeowner by adding that extra cost

Uh-huh.

Of that exterior glue option.

Yeah.

So that way they don't have any trouble at the beach. Because I have learned firsthand years and years ago when I did pretty much my first house at the beach that if you don't do that, those doors will not last.

Yeah.

So learn that the hard way, and now that mistake has never happened again.

Mhmm. That's good to know that we learn. Mhmm. So considering wood doors that will be clear coated or stained, whether they're solid or veneer, what are the most popular species of woods that people are choosing that want to see the grain and wanna see the wood?

I would say right now, white oak, whether whether it be Rift or just a quarter sawn white oak, alder is still very popular. Believe it or not, we're still doing a lot of dove fur, but people are putting, like, a really dark finish on it to kinda give it, like, a walnut look. Doug fir, a VG vertical grain Doug fir can be stained in a multiple of ways to give it so many different beautiful looks, and it is a little less expensive. Uh-huh. Because it's it's being used a lot more than, like, a white oak or, a you know, or even mahogany.

We do a lot of mahogany too, but depending on the species of mahogany you choose, it can get costly.

And are people concerned at all about sustainability with a real wood product or and and what what would lead them maybe to a veneer or to a different choice? Is that a question that's coming up?

Yeah. And and it it depends on the overall look. You know, a lot of people want a very simple look now. So, like, your Doug fir, your rift white oak, and your mahogany are very simple, very straight grained woods. Whereas, like, your alder has more of a swirl to it and has, you know, different characteristics that lend itself more to a more rustic type of look.

But no. I mean, I again, I I take this back to the finisher. If they hire somebody that knows what they're doing and and can do a lot of different varieties of faux finishing and Then then the the species of wood really is coming down to what the homeowner wants in the way of the grain. Whether it's simple and straight, and they don't wanna see anything, but they still want a stained product.

Right. Right. So the most important doors of the house are gonna swing on hinges, but there are both older and newer functional options available. Sometimes these are best selections specifically for space saving or highly decorative placement. So let's talk about the pros and cons of pocket doors, barn doors, accordion doors.

So pocket doors are amazing. They've come a long way over the years because it's really not the door. It's the frame. Yeah. If recently, in the last couple of years, I have changed the way we order pocket frames.

Normally, a standard pocket frame gets put in, the drywallers go, they put on their drywall, they mud, they tape, they do their magic. And, unfortunately, they put so much pressure on the frame that when they slide the door in, it doesn't work properly. Right. So we now pretty much only sell pocket frames, with wider slats. And what that means is the frame itself is made with taller slats, and they're reinforced with steel stiffeners.

Uh-huh.

That way, when the door gets put in, there is no problem, and the the drywallers can do their job without worrying. So there's more rigidity to the frame so it doesn't flex as much.

Yeah.

The one nice thing about pockets is it you know, if you have the room, it doesn't take up any space. It's amazing. Right. Yeah. It is amazing.

You don't have you can put furniture closer to your walls because your your doors aren't gonna need that swing space and, you know, it definitely is an advantageous product in a smaller space or on a bathroom door or somewhere like that where you don't wanna have that door swing. So I find that people either love them or hate them. Like, literally, it's like polka dots. Like, my clients love them or they don't like them at all. And sometimes they don't know that those are on the plans.

One of my recent my Oak Park modern traditional, I started to talk to them about the pocket doors, especially because I was thinking of doing a decorative one in the pantry. And the client said, we don't have any pocket doors on our plan. And I said, yeah. You do. And I showed them all the pocket doors.

And I I think a lot of people have an old memory of malfunctioning pocket doors, and, you know, they're so much better. So do you find that that true also that people love them or hate them?

Yes. And and once we describe that, even the new hardware so even though I also beef up that pocket frame, but I also use, better hardware. So over the years, once that pocket door is installed, you can't get at it without taking half of the thing apart.

Yeah.

Which who wants to do that?

Yeah.

You have to take the stop off, and you have to take all this stuff off just to get the pocket door out if there's a malfunction with the rollers or something. Now a couple of the vendors have hardware and track that actually has a gap in the track. Mhmm. So that way, the door can be easily removed without touching anything. Mhmm.

So I automatically include that in my frames now because it's just it makes sense. You spend a little bit more money now, and it's not very much

Right.

To have the ease of mind later if something did go wrong with the pocket

Right.

And the door. Nothing's guaranteed, so those rollers are not gonna last forever. But Yeah. I think when you do this, you give the homeowner a little bit of an ease of mind that if they decide, okay. I'm gonna go ahead and do the pocket.

They also have soft and soft open and close features.

Uh-huh.

So when you pull that door closed, you just pull it for a second and let go. Right. And that door closes, it's softly so it doesn't slam into the walls. And so there's a lot of really cool new features that a lot of people are starting to realize that these aren't so bad anymore.

And so as you're looking at plans that someone brings in and there's a swing door in a place that you can see might suggest a better you know, be better for a pocket door, do you suggest those things, or do you kinda stay away from altering the choices?

I suggest them if the owner says, well, gosh, that's gonna take up so much room in my room and, you know, what other options do I have? Right. Right. Look. We know the architects it costs our our owners quite a bit of money to get architects to draw plans.

Mhmm.

And we all know that not all of them listen, and that's okay. But then it's our job as our team, you know, gets with the client to show them that there are options and that here are some options that you may wanna consider, but you need to talk to your builder.

Right. Right.

Hey. Can my wall do this? Can I do I have enough space on this side or that side? So, yes, we can suggest it when the homeowner's like, wait. This room's way too small.

Or, like, bathrooms are a big thing because not all bathrooms are huge. And you don't want the door swinging into the bedroom or into a hallway, so you have to swing the door into the bathroom, but then it's gonna hit the toilet.

Yeah.

So so that's where the pocket frames come into play where it's a little bit more, of a better function.

And so it sounds like we now know from our last conversation that we need to order those windows early, especially, you know, these days because of the supply chain. But it really matters to me as a designer that we don't have to order the interior doors in at least until this the framing is sketched out because I find issues that the architect just overlooked or didn't ask three more questions that would, you know, make the client have to, want to make a different choice. So when do we have to get that order this order in for the interior doors?

You've got time. Okay. You've got time. So, normally, once the framing's done, the windows go in, and they start you know, everything else is starting. The, you know, plumbing, electrical, like, everything's starting, that's when we start to make decisions.

And then I'll ask I'll ask the builders, whoever's on the job, you know, running the projects, hey. When are you gonna be ready for interior door frames? When when do you wanna do this? When I talk to them one on one, because that's mainly who I deal with. Right.

I try not to get the homeowner involved in that because that's just one less thing they don't need to worry about.

Right.

That's what they pay the builder for. Yeah.

So Yeah. And hopefully, they have a good relationship with that builder.

Absolutely. I've got an amazing group of guys that I deal with, and they know that I'm gonna call them and say, hey. What when about are you gonna start being ready? And they'll tell me, oh, I'm six weeks out. I'm ten weeks out.

I'm I'm two weeks out. Like, okay. Well, then we waited too long Yeah. Depending on what the owner picked.

Yeah. Now I wanna tell this story because I'm sorry. I didn't mean to cut you off.

You're good. Okay. You're good.

Because because I wanna make sure that people are thinking about this process. When I started in on a project also in Oak Park, the framing was just getting it had finally been sketched out. Like, we knew know the height of the walls and where the doors were. And I realized that even though I even I had looked at the plans, even though I was a little already wondering about it from the plan stage, that the master bedroom had a walk in closet off of it and a bathroom off of it, and then the door to go to the hallway to the rest of the house. But they were planning to use one of the four bedrooms as a master walk in closet, but there was no door from the master into it.

Luckily, there was a wonderful piece of wall that was fine for a door as long as we then adjusted, you know, the way the door swung and the use of the doors. And if we hadn't seen that and adjusted it at that phase, I had images of my client, you know, getting out of bed, putting on a towel, running down the hallway past the children's rooms and turning left into his closet. So you really have to start to look at the traffic patterns and how that affects the door choices and where Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah. So now so one of the other kind of big trends that are keep keeps growing, I think, you know, was taken from ancient times, which is the barn door. How are people using those? Are they in the plans, or are those coming up in the process?

We're we're doing a lot of barn doors. And, yes, now they're starting to be drawn on the plans. Not always when they're drawn can they be used. It depends on the opening size because whatever your opening size is, you need double that. So if your opening size is 36, you need at least 36 inches to one side or the other for that door to slide over that wall.

Mhmm. And be honest with you, not everybody wants to take up that wall space either. So it just depends, and you have to have that talk way early on. But barn doors have good functionality to them. Mhmm.

There's they're not in the way. They're beautiful depending on what, you know, what you pick as far as the track and hardware. And a lot of times, we take that door and we make it more of a statement. So it doesn't match anything else in the house. It's more

of a art.

Yeah. It's like, it's a piece of art. Yeah. So I love barn doors. But, again, those have to be thought out properly because people don't realize that if you put baseboard down and you put casing around the opening, you have to plan out that barn door tracking hardware to be able to pull that door off the wall enough

Right. Right. Yeah.

To clear those items, but then you also have to make sure that you have no gaps so you don't have light coming through. We're seeing a lot of barn door bathrooms. Yeah. Yeah. So I love them.

I love barn doors because you can play with them. They're fun.

That's exactly right. Some of my recent we'll put these pictures up on the on our on our website. Some of my recent really fun uses of barn doors was we had a an apartment, a a condominium that the we've actually put a laundry into underneath the stairwell, and it's in the living room. And you walk in the house and you can see this whole space. We did beautiful kind of tongue and groove angle cut, and there were two of them that separated and met in the middle.

And so you walk in and you thought it was just a really beautiful feature, you know, wall design, and then it opened up and it was this laundry, which was great. And then one of my other Oak Park projects, they had a wing that went to the bedrooms, and they had this beautiful long wall that we could put this beautiful piece of iron and the stained wood door that then could close so that you could kind of if people were sleeping and there were entertaining going on, you could really close off that section of the house, which was, I thought, a wonderful use of barn doors. And then we use them in laundries and things like that where you don't need as much of a seal.

We're doing them in closets too.

Oh, I was just gonna segue to closets, and that's a good thing to talk about because I I kinda have problems with closet doors because I feel like they're always in the way of getting to your stuff. And yet you don't wanna look at your stuff. So so they don't have to have some of the the noise buffering features, but what are the options for closet doors, and what are the features that they're that that we need for them?

You've got your old go to of mirrored wardrobe doors, which believe it or not, people are still doing.

Yeah.

But now they've kind of the wardrobe company has company companies. There's only a couple at least around here. They've changed the game a little bit. Not everything's mirrored. So they're bypassed, so they still slide past each other.

But now we're seeing a a lot more modern looking, more wood framed, a little chunkier with, like, frosted glass and with, like, divisions in them to almost look like a like a five light door or a three light door. And I love those. They're still they're beautiful. I still do like the mirrors in some rooms depending on if you're trying to make them look a little bigger and a little more elongated. And they're cost effective still, so, they're not hard to get anymore.

When the pandemic hit, those are one of the items that

Yeah.

It took a long time to get. Oh my gosh. Again, that was because the aluminum aluminum material was just really hard to get from overseas. It was and you don't realize this stuff is all coming from all these places until something like this happens.

Mhmm.

So there's the mirrored doors. There's the frosted doors. There's stuff called sky doors that they don't have a bottom track. It's a top track. And then there's So

There's it slides easily without that tripping hazard. Right.

And then there's there's bifolds. I don't particularly like bifolds in a closet, but they do have some great functionality to them because you can get to the whole opening.

Yes. I I actually have bifold on my closet doors. We renovated my listeners all know that I was out of my house for fourteen months because a tree fell on it. But when we renovated, I mean, I live in a cottage. It's a, you know, 1,100 square foot home on purpose.

And so it's a really good choice for us because when they open, they take up less floor space. And and I get to open my whole closet because I really I always want that thing that's just beyond the bypass and makes me nuts to slide them back and forth. So so there are uses for them for sure.

Yep. People do still you know, depending on the size of the room, you can do swinging doors. I've done so just so people are aware too, barn door tracking hardware can actually come also as a bypass option.

Oh, yes. I yeah. That's what we did in the laundry room. We we were bypassed. But also you can do bi fold now on a on a barn door, which is kinda fun.

So that adds a little bit of extra, you know, zing.

Yep. Yep. And I actually like those better. But your traditional bifolds, you know, again, if if it's more of a functionality Yeah. Aspect, then that obviously is a better way to go.

Well and, you know, obviously, a higher end home is gonna be bigger. It's gonna have more space so that you should do, you know, sort of bigger, broader strokes. But, you know, in my little house, they're perfect. One of the things I also like is if if the house has the shaker door, I like to put the glass panel in the center so that we you continue that charm, which can it's not as contemporary as when the glass panels are just, you know, frameless, but it can be really attractive.

We we do a lot of that. The only thing I would warn people of on a bypass situation with a closet Uh-huh. Is if you don't have a lot of depth to the closet and the clothes sit close to the doors, you will see the clothing or the hangers or whatever through the glass. So either we have to do a little bit thicker frosting Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. So that way they don't see it. So they can still have that look, but they're not seeing things hanging. So a lot of people definitely

have to have the luxury of of depth there. But also, I I'd like mirrored panels Yes. So that you don't see through it and you get that nice reflection and something to break up all of the other shaker doors.

Yep. We can do the nice thing we can do too is we can put a mirror, like, with my MDF companies.

Yeah.

We can actually put a mirror on one side and a panel on the other.

Yeah. Mhmm. Yeah. Which is beautiful. So that you have nice solid, you know, flush paint grade, and then you open it.

And, actually, one of the things I like about my bifold, but it also works when I have hinged closet doors that open with mirrors inside. It's like you have a store where you can see front and back and adjust them, which is you know, I mean, people really need to think about their closet door. They're just not something you throw in there. And, clearly, we both we are both passionate about that.

Yes.

So then I haven't asked you about safety factors with interior doors where we did talk last episode about windows, and there's a different function of them in the house. But but are people concerned about whether there are quicker burning materials or, you know, fire retardant materials or things that make that make it safer in the result of a fire? What are people asking about or looking for?

On the interior doors, there's really you know, there really isn't anything that's geared toward fire resistant. I mean, most of our doors in the house, they're wood or they're MDF or they're, you know? The only thing that I can say, is a bonus is that, the MDF companies, which this is a big deal Yeah. They are offering non formaldehyde, door products. Uh-huh.

So your standard MDF doors and and some of your standard molded and and wood doors, you know, let's be real. They're made with chemicals.

Yeah.

And a couple of the MDF companies, you can actually specify that you want non formaldehyde doors, which that means if we did have a fire, then you didn't have that chemical burning in the house.

Uh-huh.

Especially if the whole house didn't go and you just have specific rooms. Yeah. Yeah. So there's that.

And does that occur to people to ask about whether there's a better product because what of what they've lived through?

I think for those that have been through this devastating fire, yes.

Yeah. They ask every step of the way.

Yeah. I don't honestly, you don't hear people asking about this when they haven't been through it.

So what are the things that I haven't thought about asking you that clients are are you're gonna need to ask your clients when they come in to look for door options?

You know, other than functionality, design, color of hardware that they're gonna be using, if they're gonna stain their doors, we do talk about, okay. Well, if you wanna stain your doors, what do your floors look like? What are you doing for your flooring? You know, you're you're talking to me about white oak doors, but are your floors white oak? Are your floors oak?

Are they, like, are they tile, grit? I mean, you just you don't know. So even though we don't do flooring, we do talk to them about it, especially if they're going to do a stain door because we wanna make sure whatever they do on their doors, it's gonna tie in to their flooring so it doesn't look bad. You know, we're we're trying to help them. Most of the time, if they have a designer involved, they have all that figured out.

But like I said before, not everybody has a designer involved, so we do talk to them about that. And then what you know, if they are staining, what color are you trying to get out of it? Are you trying to get a darker finish? Are you going light? If they're going light, then we have to be careful of the wood species that we use.

And then their color of hardware, it plays a huge part in what they're doing.

Yeah.

I mean,

it can tip the style in one way or another. I mean, if you'd have a beautiful slab door and you put on stainless steel, it's gonna have a very different look than if you put on, you know, iron rubbed rods.

Right.

Right.

Right. And right now, we're seeing a ton of black and a ton of the new satin brass finishes, which are beautiful. But they go on they have to put be put on the right on the right doors. Again, it's jewelry, so you have to complement it properly. Like, it's like you're putting jewelry on with an outfit.

It's the same thing.

Very good. And so then, I'm just curious. What are the, doors in your home? What what kind of door styles have you embraced?

I have shaker doors. Uh-huh. They're just one panel shakers. I'm very simple. I I I like a very clean, simple look.

I don't know that I would do that on the next house. That's the only downside of being in this business is that every day something new comes along. I'm like, oh, I like that, and I really wanna do that. And so I have to be I have to be conscious of that, that it costs money. Mhmm.

So you can't just keep changing things because things are changing. But right now, I have shaker doors with a very simple black, again, black hardware, white doors, black hardware, and I love it. The only downside to the white doors is you can see everything. And Uh-huh. So constantly wiping them down.

Yeah.

Uh-huh. Yeah.

Constantly wiping them down because my husband works out in the field where his hands are dirty. And yeah. So

That is why we have door hardware. Yep. Yep.

But for some reason

I know.

Fingerprints are up higher on the floor. And if

you have children or grandbabies, they're lower.

Yeah. Well, my kids are grown and I don't have grandbabies yet. Have fur babies, so we're good there right now.

Very good. Well, thank you so much for talking with us today about the interior doors in our home, which are they're just a huge visual element and and they should not be taken for granted. They should be used as a as an outlet and a pallet. And I wanna make sure that our listeners remember that we have an episode that we've talked to Lynette about windows and the window choices in our home, so take a look for that on our website. For more information about Coast Doors and Hardware and their products, go to www.coastdoor.net, And we look forward to hearing from you at our website, is from disastertodreamhome.com, where we will put up some pictures of some recent door choices that we talked about and some of my barn door choices and things like that.

So thank you again so much, Lynette, for joining us.

Thank

practices and the latest trends through conversations with top professionals in the building industry. You can find other episodes of From Disaster to Dream Home at ewnpodcastnetwork.com as well as Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Audible, and most other major podcast streaming services. Need design help? You can contact us or find out more about our guests at fromdisastertodreamhome.com. Until next time, let us guide and inspire you as you create the home of your dreams.