For DIY enthusiasts: reusing wooden doors

I do what I do and I end up back at recovered wood. I think it is a raw material with great potential and those who work with it have my respect. I have seen that both warehouses for this type of wood and companies that use it have appeared in our country, which seems to me a very good sign of maturity, both for the production sector and for customers. This article will also be about recovery, but this time I will talk about the reuse of wooden doors and what can be obtained from them with imagination and ... some more work. 🙂

I've heard many times from people who are redoing their apartments or houses that they have a hard time getting rid of old doors after they've replaced them with new ones. Hard to find people willing to take them, especially in warm weather when there is no prospect of putting them on fire either. But what if instead of being thrown away they were kept and later turned into useful objects? Let me give you some examples.

Old wooden doors can be used to make tables. Coffee tables can be made,

work desk,

or normal family meals.

They can be used to build a peg to put in the entrance hall,

or to make polishes for books, decorative objects or... garden tools.

A more unusual policy seemed to me to be the corner one, made from a door cut in two lengthwise. Using a more elaborate door can even make for an elegant polka dot.

From 3-4 old, lighter doors, a screen can be made to enclose an area of the house.

Keeping the same purpose, as a door, it can be used to make a discreet area for storing small items in the kitchen.

I found the following idea from a restaurant very interesting. The doors are used both to decorate the walls and as a way of displaying the wine assortment.

It all sounds very simple, but reusing doors is a bit of work. First you have to clean it well. There are also cases where they are used as they are, even if the paint has peeled off. The result is antique-looking objects that many people appreciate. If you are not one of these, then it is good to clean the doors first. It's a tricky operation and can be done by stripping with special substances (which you can find in any DIY store), followed by buffing off the soaked paint and sanding. Cleaning the old paint coat can also be done by flame burning, or by mechanical sanding (manual is too hard). And sandblasting is a way to get rid of old paint, but not for a DIY project (special equipment and protective gear is needed).

After removing the old layer, the wood is polishes white, after which it is coloured and finished according to each person's wishes. I recommend using materials that are easy to apply and give you as little hassle as possible.

Finally I have a example door reuse, it's perfect as a "here's what 2 deft hands can do" idea. John Doucet, a clever American, decided to repurpose the leftover cushions from his old sofa into a new one made from doors salvaged from neighbours in the neighbourhood. He needed three doors: one for the back, one for the sides and one for the seat.

It started with doors that looked like this,

which he cut to the size of the new sofa. He then stripped the resulting pieces, cleaned them and assembled them using salvaged screws to preserve the old look. After assembly, he sanded the wood thoroughly, stained it a mahogany shade and applied 2 coats of polyurethane varnish with sanding in between, resulting in the sofa below.

John says he worked 42 hours on the project, 30 of which were just cleaning the doors, and the cost of materials used (bath, varnish, glue, putty) came to... 55 $. Good price for a sofa.

Another thing I liked when I read about this project - this kind of furniture, made from reclaimed wooden objects, is called... frankenfurniture. 🙂