Pick a front door colour from what you cannot change: the brick or render around it, the window frames beside it, and which way the door faces. Fashion moves on, a red brick terrace does not. Test your shortlist on card against the actual wall before you commit to anything.
Work from the things you are stuck with, then choose from what is left. Four fixed elements decide which colours can work on your house, and none of them is the door.
The wall. Red brick pushes back against orange, terracotta and warm reds, and it sits well with dark green, navy and black. Yellow London stock brick takes deep blues and greys. White or cream render leaves you the widest choice, which is why render is where people go wrong. Stone wants muted colours: sage, slate, off-black.
The window frames. Most people choose a door colour and forget the windows are in shot. Either match the frames, which reads calm and deliberate, or contrast on purpose. What looks accidental is a door colour that nearly matches the frames.
Which way the door faces. A north-facing door gets no direct sun, so every colour on it reads a shade colder and darker than it does on the tin. South-facing doors get bleached and hot. If you are torn between two shades of the same colour on a north wall, take the lighter one.
The door furniture. Brass warms a colour, chrome and satin nickel cool it, and matt black hardens it. Aged brass against dark green is a different door from chrome against the same green.
Paint an A3 piece of card, or two, and hold it against the wall beside the opening. Look at it in the morning, at midday and at dusk. A small brushed patch on the existing door tells you almost nothing, because the colour underneath shows through and the area is too small to read.
British front door colours follow the building rather than the year. These pairings hold up because they were what the houses were built with.
If your house is listed, none of this is your decision. Listed building consent covers the colour as well as the door, and your conservation officer may hold you to a specific palette. Ask before you order, not after.
Yes, on timber, and it is a straightforward job over a dry weekend. On uPVC and composite it is possible but more involved, and the result rarely lasts as long as the finish it replaced. Those two have their own sections below.
The part people underestimate is the weather window. Exterior paint needs a dry day above roughly 10°C, out of direct sun, with no rain forecast for several hours after you finish. In Britain that rules out most of the year, which is why so many front doors get painted badly in a hurry.
Take the door off its hinges if you can. Painting a door flat on trestles gives you an even finish with no runs, and it lets you reach the edges properly. Leaving it hanging saves you a day and costs you the top and bottom edges.
Strip the furniture off rather than masking it. Letterplate, knocker, handle, numerals. Masking tape around a letterplate leaves a ridge of paint you will look at every day.
Sand back to a sound surface. Flaking or blistered paint has to come off, not get painted over. Fill any splits, sand flush, then dust the whole door down.
Prime bare wood. Any timber you have sanded through to needs primer before it takes topcoat. Knots want a knotting solution first, or the resin bleeds through the finish within a year.
Two topcoats, thin rather than thick. Use an exterior paint made for timber. Microporous systems let the wood release moisture instead of trapping it under a film, which is what causes blistering.
Paint the top and bottom edges. This is where most repaints fail. Both edges are end grain, both are out of sight, and both drink water. A door that swells and sticks in winter is usually a door with an unpainted bottom edge.
Leave the door off overnight if the forecast allows. Rehanging a door before the paint has hardened prints the weatherseal into the finish.
You can, and preparation decides whether it lasts. uPVC is a smooth non-porous surface, so ordinary paint has nothing to hold onto. Degrease the door, abrade it lightly, then use a primer made for uPVC or a solvent-based system sold for the purpose.
Two warnings worth having before you start. A painted finish on uPVC will not match a factory finish for durability, and it puts you on a repainting cycle you did not have before. And a dark colour absorbs heat that white does not, which on a south-facing door can be enough to distort the profile.
Our uPVC doors come finished from the factory in 32 colour and finish combinations, including six woodgrain foils: swamp oak, mahogany, Winchester, walnut, golden oak and vintage oak. The finish is applied to the profile during manufacture rather than painted onto the surface, so it does not need repainting.
Yes. A composite door has a glass-reinforced plastic skin, and it takes paint with the right primer and the same preparation a uPVC door needs.
We do not make composite doors, so this is not our product to advise on in detail. Our doors come in pine, alu-clad pine and uPVC, which you can see in our front doors range.
A factory finish outlasts a brush finish, and the reason is the conditions rather than the skill. We paint in a controlled spray environment at a set temperature and humidity, on all six faces of the door, before the hinges and the glass go in. You cannot reproduce that on a driveway in April.
It also covers the edges. A door finished in the factory has paint on its top and bottom edges and inside the rebates, which is where a door takes in water and where a site repaint almost always misses.
Painting on site makes sense in one situation: you have a door you like, the frame is sound, and you want a different colour. Replacing a door to change its colour is an expensive way to buy a tin of paint.
White is the standard colour on every door we make, and it is what the base specification carries. Other colours are available at a surcharge, and how they are applied depends on the material.
Pine and alu-clad pine are painted or stained at our factory. You choose from 12 RAL colours, or specify your own RAL Classic reference if the one you want is not on the list. Nine wood stains and a clear lacquer are available if you would rather see the grain than cover it.
uPVC carries a foil applied during manufacture, in 32 colour and finish combinations. Six of those are woodgrains, so a uPVC door can read as timber from the pavement without ever needing a brush.
Inside and outside are specified separately on the timber ranges. A dark green front door with a white inside face is a common choice, and it costs nothing extra to think about at the point of ordering.
Heritage and designer paint names do not map onto RAL references. If you have settled on a colour from a paint chart, find the nearest RAL Classic reference before you order, and expect it to be near rather than identical. RAL is a four-digit industrial standard, and it is what our spray line works in.
