Front Door Ideas

We haven’t loved our front door since we moved into this house, and we’ve been brainstorming ideas for how we can give it a total makeover without having to fully replace it. Today I’m sharing a few front door ideas, and introducing our plan to make it gorgeous! This post is sponsored by Zabitat, but all opinions are 100% mine, as usual!

Can we talk about front doors today?

I’ve never lived in a home with a front door that I loved. As silly as it sounds, I feel like the front door is actually a pretty hugely important part of the home – and when it drives you nutty, it affects your mood every time you come home.

Case in point: our last house had a cheaply-made wood door that tended to swell every time it rained. That meant anytime the weather got super humid or rainy (which, hello, I live in Texas and humid is our middle name), it was difficult to open and close. Which meant every time I came home, I dealt with this minor annoyance that immediately put me in a slightly worse mood.

This house has a similar problem – the door handle has been broken since we moved in, and we planned on replacing it but just never got around to it. Jackson can’t open our front door and people regularly think it’s locked when, really, it’s just broken. In addition to that, there’s only one window on the front of our house (and it’s in the nursery), which means that our entry is super dark all the time.

I don’t know about you, but rooms with no natural light just depress me a little bit.

I’ve been itching to replace our front door since the moment we moved into this house, but front doors are expensive. Plus, it felt a little silly to get rid of a perfectly fine door just because I wanted it to have a window. So, when Zabitat reached out to me to see if I’d be interested in partnering with them for a front door makeover, I did a little dance and gave them a big fat “yes” so fast your head would spin.

I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that I’ve already told every single person I know in real life about this company because I had no idea a product like this existed and I’m so excited about it I can’t even think straight.

What is Zabitat? 

Ooooh boy, am I ever excited to answer this question. Zabitat is a company that sells everything you need to take your front door from boring and basic to gorgeous and totally custom. And I mean everything. From retractable screen doors to enclosed blinds to glass replacement to glass door inserts (YOU HEARD ME RIGHT),  Zabitat has every single thing you could possibly think of to transform your front door.

Can I just re-emphasize what I just said, here? This company makes it possible for you to add a window to a front door that doesn’t have one.

And even more mind-blowing? It’s easy enough to do yourself! They offer installation services, but if you’re a big DIY-er like me, you can absolutely do this project on your own. I should know – we finished our front door makeover this weekend!

I promise I’ll spill all of the details on how our door turned out soon, but today I want to focus on sharing some front door ideas to help you understand how we chose what we did, and what the options are.

Wait, so how do I add a window to my front door?

I’ll get into all of the nitty gritty DIY details next week when I share our door’s big makeover, but let me give you a little rundown of how it works:

• This product works on steel or fiberglass doors (not wood doors).
• To add a window to a front door, you’ll simply use a jigsaw to cut a hole in your door the same size as the window, then follow the simple directions to insert the window and frame.
• THAT’S IT. If you’ve ever installed a doggy door in your home, it’s a similar process – and, to be honest, I was a little shocked that it was so incredibly simple.

You can also replace existing door glass if your door has a window that you don’t love. Some door windows can get really cheesy really fast, and if you’ve got a front door that makes you cringe but you love the natural light, it’s a breeze to simply swap the window out with something a little more you.

It’s so exciting I’m dancing in my chair just thinking about it.

How did you choose your front door window? 

If you’re adding a window to an existing door, the design of your door will dictate the size of your window. For example, I really wanted to do a window that covered 3/4 of the door, because those windows make my heart happy – they’re big enough to let in a ton of light, they look high-end, and they’re high enough off the ground that my dog won’t be constantly barking out the window. But, because our door was a 6-panel door, if we did a design like that we would have cut straight through one of the panels and it would have looked weird (see the above “before” picture if you’re having a hard time picturing what I mean). So, our options were a full window, a half window, or a small window at the top part of the door.

A full window was immediately out due to the barking dog, and I wanted something a little more impactful than just the top of the door, so we decided to go with a window that would take up about half the door. To determine the exact measurement you need, just follow the handy directions on Zabitat’s site to ensure you get an accurate sizing (this door glass selection guide should help you!)

Once we knew the size we wanted, we browsed the options and chatted about what we each loved. Corey wanted something super simple and classic – I would have been willing to try something a little more unique,  but in the end we landed on a simple 9-panel option with rain glass – meaning, it provides plenty of privacy and we won’t have people spying on us when we’re lounging in our living room in the evenings.

But, just for fun, here are a few of the other options we looked at:

FRONT DOOR IDEAS

ONE // TWO // THREE // FOUR // FIVE // SIX

How good are these? There are dozens more that I loved – it’s kind of incredible how many choices they have.

SO. Our door. You’re dying to see it, right? I’m dying to show you! I still have a few finishing touches to put on the post about it, so get excited and next week I’ll be back to share the big reveal of how we totally overhauled our front door in just one day (and for a lot less than we would have spent buying a brand new one)!

Does your front door have a window? Do you wish it did if it doesn’t?!