{DIY Door Casings}…the easy way.

We finally finished our door casings!

And although it was a pretty easy project, it did seem to take us a long time.  We just couldn’t seem to find a stretch of time to finish.  We’ve been done with this project for a couple of months, but picture taking has been on the back burner. 

Overall, I think they look great.  And I am surprised at how they lift the overall look of our ceilings, which I think help make our rooms look taller and larger.  We succeeded in finding a way to remove/demolish very little of our house.  We removed absolutely zero dry wall, and very little of our baseboards, to get a great look!

We have rather large entries, which include one to our front room (a den or small living room) and two to our dining room.  Here is the way they looked before we added the casings…

Pretty blah.

And here is how they look now…

Here is what you will need for each casing:
Dremel Multi-Max
Nail gun (I wouldn’t do this without it!)
Miter saw
Screw driver
Utility Knife
1x4 (x 4 for both sides of the casings, measured from the floor to the top height)
1x6 (x2 for both sides of the top of the casings, measured for the width of the casing)
1x6 (for the base shoe of the casing)
lattice…and a whole bunch of it!

Stage 1: Taking Away Woodwork (Side note: This step made us a little lot nervous.)

We used a Dremel Multi-Max and measured the exact width of the vertical board and marked our baseboard.  Then using the Dremel, we cut it straight and removed the piece of baseboard.  This method allowed us NOT to remove the entire baseboard.

Stage 2: Adding The Woodwork

This was really fun because our vision was coming to life!  Through trial and error, we found that nailing the top (horizontal piece of the wood) first, and then adding the vertical pieces was best.

And here is what it looked like with just the vertical pieces nailed and in place. (Oh, and by the way, we had to take off the switch plates.)

We had to add a base shoe to each side because you could see where the floor was cut, and didn’t really meet up with the wall.  (See above picture)

For the shoe, or the base of the casings, we used a 1x6 and essentially just wrapped the base of the opening…

Notice in some of the pictures above, how the wood meets the dry wall?  Obviously, we didn’t like it.  And we had to cover it up…somehow! So, we added lattice to frame it all out and to hide those seams. We primed the lattice before nailing it up to the wall. 

The pictures below show the casings without the cove molding under the 1x2. 

Small Change Alert!

We added a thin piece of lattice to the bottom of the horizontal piece of 1x6.  It framed the whole look out nicely, and just adding a detail we felt we were missing.

Caulk, spackle, tape and paint with the same paint that matches your trim.  We caulked the where any piece of wood meets the wall or any other piece of wood. (Our trim happens to be Extra White by Sherwin Williams in semi-gloss.)

Look at that handsome painter…  He’s a good one, I tell ya.

And here are some more “after” pictures.  We are so happy with them! 

We have two smaller entries that lead into our kitchen and our “morning room.”  Our morning room is a window filled room that we have converted to a play room for “The Kid.”  I love that it is off the kitchen, so we are always together.  I have big plans for these casings!