I Use This Brilliant $20 Screen Door from The Home Depot Every Day

My husband and I live in a prewar apartment building in Brooklyn with very sturdy brick construction and no central air conditioning. As such, when the weather starts to feel like spring — like north of 70 degrees — we try to keep our windows open all day long. We get a really strong cross breeze in the front rooms of our apartment, and the heavy brick construction makes our home pretty cool on the interior. We also have a deck that helps with that cross breeze, but we could never keep the door open to experience it because of bugs. 

Because we’re renters, we didn’t want to invest in installing a real screen door to replace our deck’s storm door or try putting in a screen sliding door between the storm door and the interior door. One day, when we were walking our dog, we noticed one of our neighbors had an identical deck setup, but they were using a black sheer screen door with a dark slit down the middle to solve the same issue we were having. It took a couple of speculative Google sessions for me to find the product they were using — a black fiberglass magnetic screen door — and I bought one for $20 from The Home Depot after measuring it to fit our door width (36 inches).

Installing it was beyond easy. All we had to do was clean our door frame, install the velcro tape to the edges of the curtain and peel it back, and then press it along the door frame. Our kit also came with push pins (which we also used) to extra-secure the edges of the door curtain to the door, and voilà. The whole process took about 15 minutes with a measure twice, apply once mindset. And instantly, we could prop open our storm door all day long without having to worry about flies, mosquitoes, or other bugs. 

If we owned the apartment, we would have probably bought an installable sliding screen door or replaced the storm door altogether to be mesh rather than the one we have, but for our needs and how much we’re willing to put into it, it’s the perfect solution. Plus it means our dog can walk indoors and outdoors onto the deck all day long to sunbathe — her favorite thing to do — and our home is full of fresh air from the moment we wake up to when we close up shop at sundown. 

Since we’ve had the screen door for almost five years now, we now need to replace it as it’s been the victim of some very normal wear and tear. But spending $20 every five years to replace a household upgrade is not a problem for me in the slightest. And for how much it helps us with indoor-outdoor living — as much as we can get in Brooklyn — it’s an excellent solution and one of the best things we’ve bought for our space. I can’t wait to open up all our doors again come spring.

Buy: Black Fiberglass Magnetic Screen Door, $20.38