First impressions are often lasting impressions. So, ensure that the entrance to your house is attractive, smart, clean, noiseless and, last but not the least, inviting.

Unfortunately though, front doors suffer from a variety of faults, the commonest of which are eroded polish and chipped paintwork. Other troubles include the door not opening and closing properly, dirty panels and mouldings, tatty wooden thresholds and, if there is any stonework, iron stains and grime. All these can easily be set right.

Polish pointers

If doors are to be re-polished, they should not be stripped with a blow-lamp, as this tends to char the wood.

First remove all the door furniture like handles and latches. Wearing rubber gloves, brush a good chemical paint stripper all over the door, leave it to work for 15 minutes, then scrape the softened varnish off. Start at the top of the door.

Difficult mouldings may require coarse wire wool to get the last traces of varnish off. Repeat this treatment as often as necessary until the wood is bare. Then wash the door with warm water (no soap) to remove the stripper, or the new varnish will not bond to it. Any gaps and cracks in the wood should then be filled.

When the surface of the door is repaired to your satisfaction, rub it down all over with fine glass paper and seal the grain with a half-and-half mixture of polyurethane varnish and turpentine. Allow this to dry and rub it down again with fine paper, but not so hard as to wear through the thin coat. Now apply a coat of neat varnish, not too thickly, or it will run.

When it is dry, rub it down with 'flour grade' paper (the finest glass-paper). Repeat this at least twice until the surface is thickly coated and perfectly smooth, and then apply a final coat of varnish without standing. The more coats you put on, the longer it will last.

Painting is easy

Repainting a door is less trouble because the colour of the wood underneath does not have to be preserved. You can remove the paint quickly and easily with a blowlamp, taking all reasonable safety precautions, but be sure to remove all the door furniture before you begin or you will ruin it.

When the paint is all off, repair any damaged section. You can patch the smaller holes with ordinary wood because appearance does not matter, provided the surface is smooth. Rub the whole door down with fine glasspaper, then apply wood primer, an undercoat and two to three top coats.

Non-drip gloss paint is very good for front doors, because ordinary paint tends to collect in drips along the lower edge of mouldings, no matter how carefully it is applied. It is worthwhile aiming for a really smooth gloss on a front door because it is a genuinely eye-catching feature.

Clean up

Most old doors have brass fittings that are black with age and look shabby. But don’t throw them away. Brass, unlike iron, does not rust and any brass fitting, however tarnished, can be made to sparkle again. The change is amazing. Even the most revolting old door furniture can be transformed into something to be proud of.

If some of your fittings are brass and some steel, you could make the steel ones match the polished brass (more or less) by painting them with gold paint. Varnish the top of the gilding (with clear polyurethane varnish, not cellulose) to prevent it from discolouring.

To be continued

(The author is an interior design consultant, specialising in the design of corporate and residential interiors. As a senior faculty member at a Calcutta institute, she has delivered lectures, guided research and conducted projects in the field of ‘Housing & Interior Design’ for over two decades. She can be contacted at kusumsmail@yahoo.com )