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Become a MemberMay 2, 2011
This exterior wooden door, made completely by hand using locally harvested white oak was commissioned by a local client.
The family live in a beautiful ‘heritage property’ here in Toronto that comes along with certain benefits and possible grants to help finance portions of projects like this one.
These perks are offered to home owners living in designated historic properties and you should check to see if your home is registered or should be.
The details in a reproduction piece of this magnitude can be found and identified through hand crafted joinery techniques, wood grain aesthetic and design decisions. The utmost care is given to scale and sizes. Hand carved shapes with accurate moulding profiles all being carefully reproduced using hand tools alone. A true reproduction in every sense of the word.
If you’d like a quote for an exterior or interior solid wooden door, maybe an architectural element or detail custom made for your home, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.
Follow the links to find more on this door or click the side bar Heritage Wooden Door Link to see every step that went into making this very special project.
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That’s terrific work. I’m hoping one of these days I can do something similar to replace our turn of the century and falling apart front door. (Which unfortunately lost it’s stained glass a few years before we moved in.)
I’m glad to see the grants available on your side of the border to help encourage keeping the character of those homes. In some of the places I’ve lived, home-owners have been unwittingly forced into seemingly arbitrary upkeep decisions by the zoning regs, (and their definition of historic has at times and places been quite loose, and at other times places quite tight) without always having some of the resources to help available. (My favorite was a fellow who was told by one planning organization in town he was required to replace wood siding with cement board in because of fire concerns with the closeness of houses, and told by another he had to use the wood siding because to preserve the character of the property! He was stuck with rotting siding for a while before he could get clarification!)
It’s a tight rope to walk, the balance between upkeep and historic preservation; more of these programs are turning up here, and I hope that it means we’ll see fewer houses degrade into as such terrible condition as struggling homeowners have tried to figure out how to afford a more expensive (but proper) fix. Right now in our small New England town, though, it seems like all we’ve been able to find is free exterior paint, and some lead abatement programs.
Did you build the door into a new frame, or was it hung into an existing one?
Joshua,
Thanks for the great comments. The frame and entire side glass and transom were replaced as well but that work was contracted out to a small company here in Toronto. They did a great job hanging my door and I’m happier for it-; )
all the best in New England, if you’re ever near the Ballentine’s Boat shop stop in and say hello for me ~
cheers!
Tom, great job on that door, I ordered your book at amozon and am waiting to get my hands on it. I do have a question, isn’t oak hard to work by hand? I have read a lot of hand tool only guys that oak can be a real pain to work. However I have no experince using it with just hand tools. Anyway great job and look forward to seeing more of your work!
Thanks Andy,
Oak is quit hard and heavy but a sharp hand plane will get through no problem. So on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the best wood to work, I’d give oak around a 7..not too bad at all.
Thanks for the question and comments-
Well if I may, what is your number 10 of wood? or is that addressed in your book?
Ha !- no, I don’t think I covered that in my book~; )
I guess the ‘friendly’ woods, or the ’10’s‘ if you will are the maples, walnut, cherry- those are all in the 10 area…they’re good to work with hand tools. I’ve heard people say oak is too hard to work with hands tools as well- granted it’s tough but bot too bad in my opinion. The quarter sawn stock was really nice.
I really don’t enjoy working with exotics very much. But hey, every piece is different and they all have their challenges or benefits. I had a piece of quarter sawn cherry one time and I remember it being one of the nicest pieces I’ve ever worked with.
Cheers!