Before and After: Boring Closet Doors Get a Glam, Geometric Glow-Up for Just $10
The colorful, geometric wall mural trend continues to dominate in 2021. If you’re not ready to commit to a full-on panoramic pattern, you could try starting on a smaller scale — like on a set of nondescript closet doors, for example.
Homeowner Sujata Sharma decided to do just that. Her sliding closet doors were the perfect blank canvas for fun experimentation with paint.
In fact, the doors actually needed a fresh coat of paint anyway, since they had a few scuffs and sticker residue here and there.
To add the interest she craved, Sujata opted to paint a rhombille tile pattern (aka tumbling block pattern) on the basic builder-grade doors. First, she had to remove the doors from the tracks and clean them, and then it was time for primer and white paint.
After the white paint dried, Sujata taped out her tile-like pattern. As expected with such a precise patten where any mistake would be noticeable, the hardest part of the project was taping and measuring, Sujata says.
“Have loads of patience,” she advises. “Chances are you will mess up and then will have to start over.”
But she loves her final result, and having to start over on the taping was worth it in the end because it turned out exactly as she had envisioned, she says.
“I would not do anything differently,” she says of her teal, gold, and white doors that add a touch of mid-century flair (and a bit of optical illusion) to the space.
Her pro tip is to paint over the taped lines one more time in white paint (or whatever your base color is) for extra crisp edges. After adding the teal and gold, Sujata also added two coats of varnish for durability during sliding.
In total, she spent less than $10 to get the look because her paint was left over from a previous project. All she had to buy was the thin masking tape.
Sujata says the doors sparked a vision for the rest of the room, as they were part one of an entire room makeover. Here’s to happy, colorful, and carefully measured DIYs ahead!
Inspired? Submit your own project here.