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Exterior Updating: NEW PAINT REVEAL!!

First of all, I have to apologize for keeping you hanging if you’ve been following this little exterior update journey of mine. I’ve had a couple of people asking when I planned to share the finished product, and that day is here!!

The last post was over a month ago and the painting was in progress at that time. It’s been done for a couple of weeks now, but I’ve held off sharing because we had some trouble getting the tree stump in front cut down completely with our small chain saw, and had to call in reinforcements. In other words, I had to wait until my dad could help the hub finish the job because it pains me to show you an ‘After’ photo with half a dead tree blocking the front porch. You know me… I like pretty things.

ANYWAY… I will keep you in suspense no longer, and I’m very excited to show you what feels like a brand new house:

House THEN

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I warned you when we started this exterior update journey that it would be a dramatic change. Seriously though! It has been a LONG time coming, and I am just so giddy every time I pull into the driveway. I LOVE IT!

The color we chose is absolutely the best warm charcoal gray. Sometimes it looks lighter or darker in certain lights, but it always looks great to me. The robin’s-egg-blue front door is the perfect focal point now that  you can actually see the porch. We’ve had so many compliments already, and have even had people drive by taking photos and one lady who stopped to ask about the color because she liked it so much. The great response from our friends and neighbors has made it even more rewarding for me. And after a five-year wait, that’s a lot!

Our painter did such a great job, and our carpenter was amazing too. He even came back at the last-minute to add an extra bit of trim to one spot that was bothering me. It was a minor crisis avoided. Most of the work he did occurred last fall. We had known for a while that the exterior needed a lot of repairs before we could even think about painting. The siding was rotting in several places, one of the bedroom windows leaked and was all messed up, and there was just a lot to do. Remember this situation?

House Repairs

Not pretty.

Once all that was done, I had the carpenter add a few extra trim touches to give the house a little more of a custom-look, and allow us to use more than one paint color. I knew we would be going dramatically dark, and wanted to break up the planes a little to avoid the charcoal becoming too overwhelming. Our carpenter added horizontal boards across all the peaks (We missed one over the garage and that was what he came back to add later on while the paint was going up!), creating a triangle that we painted a slightly lighter gray.

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I love how it gives a craftsman vibe to the exterior, even though this isn’t a true craftsman house. I’m toying with adding a few more craftsman trim details (down the line) to amp that up even more.

This is my favorite side of the house because of all the layers. Sadly, it faces away from the street, so no one but me sees it. But just knowing it’s there and looks awesome is enough for me. It will look even better next year when my baby plants fill in more! Here is a before and after of that side:

Designing Dawn - side yard landscape

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Here is the back of the house. I love how it sets off the painted deck (Which we will be repainting again next year… but that’s another story.) One of the special requests I made of our painter was to paint all the trim, gutters, soffits, and eaves around the whole house white, including all the window trim. This is not common in our area, as usually the front of the house has trim painted, but the sides and back and soffits are all the same color. Don’t ask me why. I HATE that. I could not live with having this whole back of the house be one big dark box, and I think the front would have looked too dark and flat with the soffits not painted white. So my painter thought I was a little crazy, but he did such a great job with all the detail work, and it was 100% worth the extra money to me.

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In case you’ve missed any of this exterior update journey, here are some links:

• Exterior repairs
• New garage door
• Front door paint
• Landscaping & tree removal
• Picking paint colors

Home Transformaiton from DesigningDawn.com

We have a few more small things I’d like to do out here. I plan to replace the doorbell soon and add a little more definition to the stonework out front. And then down the line, I’d like to tweak the front landscaping a little, bulk up the porch column a bit, possibly add a porch railing, and update the large front windows… dreams. We also still need to hang new house numbers… which are currently sitting just inside the front door. And then there’s always the whole backyard and one side of the house that still need landscaping help desperately. But at least the front is 95% done! Yay!!

*dawn sig

 

27 Comments

  • melissa

    hey ! I LOVE the outcome of your home ! I am about to paint my vinyl. BUT..everyone keeps saying DO NOT color it dark bc it can cause it to attract heat and cause my vinyl to buckle. Has your vinyl buckled? I would love to see a pic of the house now..since its been since 2015 that you painted..and its 2018 now. can you give us an update? PLEASE ! I would so appreciate your input !

    Reply
  • Nancy Mann

    You did a marvelous job with this home .It is amazing what a little time, creativity, talent, and yard work can do in transforming a place. My house has been “a work in progress” toward the same goal for the last 6 months, but I need some expert advice, if you will; the only difference is I am doing the outside and the inside. Ugh!

    My new roof is being installed as I type this message so we are on our way, but I would love your opinions, suggestions, and advice on what my plans are for the outside transformation. My house is cedar and I live on 11 acres set back in the woods. It is a one-story ranch style home with a 40X10 foot front porch and a side screen porch.

    My plans are to paint the house mocha and the trim cream, then reverse the pattern on the front porch, whereas painting the wall of the house cream and the trim mocha and railing on the steps mocha.

    The porch floor and steps will be painted Benjamin Moore “Dragon’s Breath (a dark green, almost black color). My front door is dark green as are my shutters on each sides of the double windows.

    First of all, I am debating on the reversal, I am just mot sure how that is going to turn out.?.?. I like the concept, but it is different.

    My next quandry is trying to find a good mocha color for the house. It seems that mocha has so many shades, depending on the perception of the color from all of the Vendors and after having looked at them cannot settle on what I consider a GOOD color. Have you any suggestions from your experience? It will have to be a paint stain since the house is cedar, but that is not a problem, most paint stores can make a stain any paint color.

    I have 17 flower beds in my yard that have been attended to, so that part has been taken care of and my walkways are gravel and stones in the front, with a gravel patio and brick walkways in the back yard. All flower beds are surrounded by hand picked granite rocks and designed by me, so the are not “bootleg”. LOL

    I will e-mail you a picture of the house before anything had been done to it. . . I was out of commission for about 18 months due to a near fatal car accident, but I am ALIVE, number 1, and up and running with only a couple of disablilities now. I am thankful for that, but it was tough.

    I think that covers it and thank you in advance. I look forward to hearing from you.

    Nancy Mann

    Reply
  • Linda

    Hi. I am having a similar issue that Joanna had. I want to paint my now Chocolate brown colored house grey, but my roof is brown.

    Reply
  • Kellie

    What color is the door?

    Reply
  • Kami Brown

    I would love to change my house color, currently it is white siding with green shutters (yuk!). Is your siding wood siding??

    Reply
    • Dawn Sailors

      Hi! It’s not real wood. It’s some kind of weird composite I think. I don’t know much about that though. Sorry!

      Reply
  • Susan Urban

    I love this. I was looking for a way to paint my house. It’s beige and brown and BLAH. This looks amazing. I’m glad we’re not neighbors…I may use your idea :-)

    Reply
  • DIY April

    It’s perfect! I just bought a fixer upper and was looking for the right shade of gray. This is it. Thank you so much

    Reply
  • Pepper Arden (@Gigi2u4ever)

    I love it it looks so Great and the color makes that white just pop and the robins eggs Blue is Terrific

    Reply
  • Becky

    Can you tell me the color of paint you chose for the exterior? I LOVE IT!!

    Reply
    • Dawn Sailors

      Thank you! The main color is Sherwin Williams Urbane Bronze. The lighter gray is Sherwin Williams Dovetail. Both are color matched to Pittsburgh Paint. Hope that helps!

      Reply
      • Becky

        Yes. Thank you!!!

        Reply
      • Diane

        Hi, your home is gorgeous! The urban bronze looks brownish and your home looks dark gray…? Is it just the lighting, or in person is it gray?

        Reply
        • Dawn Sailors

          Thank you so much! It’s one of those colors that is difficult to pinpoint. I guess I’d call it a deep warm gray. It definitely has brown undertones, which gives it a rich look, but I don’t think you’d look at the house and call it brown. Not sure if that helps at all!

          Reply
  • Joanna

    Love the paint colors, and trim. Can you tell me the color of your roof? We have brown shingles and I am afraid to go grey on the house.

    Reply
    • Dawn Sailors

      I wish I could! It was this color when we moved in and we bought the house from the bank, so we didn’t even know the garage door code, let alone the shingle color. :/ I would describe it as a medium brown?? But it’s not a very redish brown. I assume the roof is getting up there in age though, so we’ll likely be replacing it at some point.

      Reply
    • Dawn Sailors

      As a side note, that was one reason I really wanted to go for a warm gray on the house color. I was afraid a cool/blue gray would make the roof stand out too much!

      Reply
  • Debbie Leonard Traynor

    Stunning! I love the detail, and the upper garage door window panel. I also love how you painted the foundation to match the house color!! Excellent job!

    Reply
  • Sandra Koll

    Looks great! Love the white horizontal boards! I noticed that there wasn’t a horizontal board across the part that is above the deck…was thinking that might look good.

    Reply
    • Dawn Sailors

      Thanks, Sandy! I agree that would look nice. It’s kind of a tricky spot, because it bumps out there, and on one section there is actually a roll-up awning that we can pull out over the deck. So we would have to remove that before we could add another piece of trim there. Maybe someday though! I’m not a fan of the awning at all so I wouldn’t be sad to see it go. ;)

      Reply
  • Cado

    Looks awesome! It makes your house look a lot bigger too, I guess because of all the contrast in the trim now

    Reply
  • Jacklyn

    Stunning! I painted (Yes, ME!) our house last summer– I wasn’t brave/creative enough to boldly change the color pallet much, but it was still a huge improvement. I love your color choices!

    Reply
    • Dawn Sailors

      Thank you!! I can’t believe you did yours yourself. I don’t think I would have the patience or stamina for that. It would have ended up with one coat of patchy peeling paint this time next year…haha. Great job!!

      Reply
      • Carissa

        Hi Dawn! The house is gorgeous! May I ask what color code the white trim is? Is it Sherwin Williams as well?

        Reply
        • Dawn Sailors

          Thanks so much! For the white trim, I just asked my painter to use pure white and didn’t actually pick out a specific tint.

          Reply

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