A new exterior door color (also, what color should the porch be?)

As you know from previous posts, I decided to use a different door color this time. I still really liked the previous door color, Benjamin Moore Bird of Paradise, but I’ve had this door color for several years and decided I wanted a change. In the years since I selected this door color, my decor has leaned more toward pinks than corals. So I decided to remove the coral and look for a color that leaned more towards pink. But this coral is still at the top of my list of favorite exterior door colors.

Bird of Paradise is a very saturated coral color that leans heavily towards orange. If you are looking for a coral color for your front door, I highly recommend it.

But keep in mind that if your door receives direct sunlight, it will probably need a new coat of paint every year (or at least every two years) because it will definitely fade. The side door of my studio receives direct sunlight almost all day, every day, and that beautiful, saturated coral had become almost a pastel version of itself.

The front door doesn’t get as much direct sunlight, so it doesn’t fade as much as the study door. But after a couple of years it still fades a bit. I don’t have a recent photo showing just the front door, but you can see in this recent photo from last week’s planting beds post that the color is not as vibrant as when it was freshly painted. Even faded, it’s still a pretty color.

But like I said, my choral era is over. Since last night, my doors are decidedly pinker. The new color is Benjamin Moore Rosy Blush. It is a very saturated reddish pink color.

I used Benjamin Moore Advance paint with a satin finish and this paint is amazing. I love to paint. I find it very relaxing and satisfying, especially if I use a high quality paint that applies smoothly. And this painting definitely fits the bill. It’s a little brighter than I expected. It’s labeled “satin,” but I would consider it more of a semi-gloss.

And here is the front door with its new paint color. You’ll just have to imagine the front porch with its new coat of paint and everything clean. We are just going through our rainy/wet season, so everything is covered in dirt and grime. It’s time to get out the pressure washer and clean everything. And of course, I’ll be painting the front porch soon too, so the faded porch boards will soon be a deep dark brown.

But a nice front door is a good start. In addition to painting the porch boards, finishing the baseboards, and cleaning all the white trim (and possibly giving them a new coat of paint), I also plan to replace the front door lights. I think larger lights would look better here, so I’ll change these lights out for larger ones and then use these smaller ones in my workshop.

While we’re talking about exterior paint finishes, remember what the roof of my front porch looked like? There were knots all over the ceiling that had gone through the paint.

So I used Zinsser BIN shellac-based primer (my favorite primer) on the ceiling and then gave it a new coat of paint.

I did this a little over three years ago. This is what the ceiling looked like with its new paint three years ago.

And here it is three years later. It needs cleaning (again, constant humidity leaves a dirty film of grime and yuck on everything), and I think the paint color has faded a bit, but three years later, there are still no knots bleeding out.

But that brings me back to the porch over the side door of the studio. While painting that door, I remembered again that the roof of that little porch doesn’t match the other exterior roofs. The porch ceiling and garage ceiling are painted light blue.

But the roof of the porch is white. I think they should all agree, right? You already know how much I like consistency, that’s why it seems to me that this little ceiling should coincide with the other two. But I tend to overthink things, so you can tell me what you think. Should I paint it light blue to match the other two, or should this one stay white?

While you contemplate the color of my little porch roof, I’ll leave you with a good view of the new color of my door. I know that many of you will still prefer the coral color of my door, and that’s okay. But I was ready for a change and I love this new color. And painting is so quick and easy! So maybe I’ll go back to coral in the future. But for now I’m in my pink era.