Easy, high impact painting project {black doors and white trim, oh my!}
Last Updated on May 21, 2019
Today I am going to talk to you about what a difference painting trim and doors can make in your space. Specifically, I am going to show you how AMAZING black doors and white trim can look!
Most of our main level was full of trim and doors that were painted the most unfortunate color. I don’t know how to describe it other than to say it looks a lot like the color of a manilla folder…or puke. We have slowly but surely been eliminating it from our downstairs rooms and IT HAS MADE SUCH A BIG DIFFERENCE! Even if we changed nothing else in our downstairs rooms, painting the trim and doors white would have transformed the spaces somewhat all on its own.
Most recently, we have been working on our kitchen makeover. Yep, the kitchen was full of the puke colored trim and doors {okay, okay, I suppose I should refer to it as “beige,” though that doesn't accurately capture the unfortunate color}. Here’s a reminder for you of what we started with.
We decided to paint all of the trim white. Take a look for yourself at the difference in the original trim color and the white that we chose {which is not even a BRIGHT white, it has a fair amount of grey in it}. WOW. Painting the trim white made such an impact in the room.
But, the MOST EXCITING transformation is that we decided to paint the interior doors black. So we now have black doors and white trim. Ahhhhh, so pretty! This is a trend that a lot of you may have seen on other blogs and all over Pinterest. I myself have drooled over the photos in Pinterest. Well, we finally took the plunge and I love it! It’s like my kitchen is wearing a tuxedo :) It just makes the room look classy and high end. Amazing what a little paint can do! We also changed out the door hardware from antique bronze to an oil rubbed bronze.
And here's a side-by-side so that you can get the full effect of the difference the black doors and white trim made. Quite a transformation from the puke colored trim and doors, don't you think?
You may be asking yourself why I am showing you only one tiny piece of the kitchen. Why am I showing you only the trim around the pantry and the pantry doors? Well, you didn’t think I would give you too many previews of the kitchen before we finish it, did you?! You have already seen our upcycled DIY herringbone plank wall and a sneak peek of our painted kitchen floors, right? What more do you expect? Be patient. The kitchen reveal is coming soon!!!! Stay tuned. UPDATE: The kitchen reveal is finally up on the blog. Click HERE for all the details!
For now, I just hope I have shown you how very simple, inexpensive changes such as the color of your trim and interior doors can make a HUGE impact in a space. Anyone can paint their trim and doors!
Have you totally transformed a space by simply painted your trim and/or doors? I would love to hear about your experience.
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Your door looks great! I’m obsessed with black doors and have a couple of question before jumping in. Did you paint the entire door, front and back? If not, didmyou paint the sides or leave them white? Seems to make sense to paint the sides… Thanks so much.
We painted the sides black but left the inside white because the shelves are white! I think they would look good black too though!
What color and brand of white paint did you use for the trim?
Honestly I just used whatever I had on hand. I think it was Sherwin Williams?
Did you sand the trim
Down? I wanted to use the milk paint on my trim too but wasn’t sure what you used.
I do not recommend milk paint for trim based solely on the cost alone! I did sand not sand before i painted.
It looks very nice; very classy. :-) I plan on on a black door in the living room now. It will obviously work very well with BM French Canvas walls and BM White Dove trim. :-)
Sounds great! Good luck!
This is exactly what I want to do in my kitchen, simple and easy, I know it will take some work, but I did NOT want to have to strip down all of my drawers and doors. My question is, what kind of paint did you use for the cabinets themselves? I also like the Seagull Gray and was wondering if I could use the Driftwood color for the cabinets, I think it would be a great contrast, or vice a versa.
Thank you—love your blog!!!!
Hi Lyne! All of the details of our kitchen cabinet painting can be found here: https://designertrapped.com/2014/06/paint-your-kitchen-cabinets.html. We used General Finishes milk paint for the cabinets. I think Driftwood would be BEAUTIFUL on perimeter cabinets. We used it on our island and would have used it on all the cabinets if our kitchen had more natural light. I hope that helps!
Hi, I was wondering if you painted the hinges on your doors or purchased new. I love how this turned out! We painted over the orangey wood trim in our old home before listing it and the difference it made was HUGE!
Hi Lindsey, we purchased new hinges. Yes, I bet it made a world of difference in your trim, but I bet that was a lot of work!
Wondering what paint you used for trim and finish of the paint
Hi Melissa! I used semi-gloss latex for both. I don’t recall the brand/name of the white, but the black is Kettle Black by Valspar. Hope that helps!
Hi- I’m thinking about painting all the trim in my house. Did you sand it first? Your entire kitchen is beautiful! Painting my cabinets is next!
We did not sand first, Lori. Thank you!!! Good luck with your painting!
Ha!!! We must have been cut from the same mold. I JUST finished painting all our bedroom and bathroom doors black with white trim, am in the process of painting over our own “puke” colored trim elsewhere (Manila folder color describes it EXACTLY!!!), did our kitchen cabinets in General Finished java gel stain last year, and found your blog because my husband and I are about to make our own plumbing pipe table and wanted to see how other people did theirs. Great minds think alike!!! :)
Ha, ha! That is awesome, Stacey! So glad you found my blog. I hope you will stop by often!
Hi Looks Gorgeous! Doing the same to my interior door and wondering what color you used?
Thanks
Colleen
Thanks so much Colleen! It is Kettle Black by Valspar, also sold at Lowe’s Home Improvement {semigloss finish}. Hope that helps! Happy new year!
Love my black interior doors. But now worried about replacing door handles. I have bought the Venetian bronze handles and wonder if that will looks right. I don’t want to go back with white doors !!!
Hi Tanya! I think a venetian bronze finish will be beautiful on black doors!
Hi! Did you use milk paint to paint the door black as well?
I did not. I used latex, semigloss Valspar Paint in Kettle Black. I hope that helps!
So what paint did you use for the trim? Latex or oil based? Did you sand and prime first?
Hi Renee. The existing trim paint was latex, so we used latex to paint over it. We did not prime or sand before painting. I hope that helps!
I LOVE this! I have black trim in my kitchen/dining room and living room and love it! My laundry room doors are still not painted and are a horrible brown oak color, GAG! But I’m really thinking I’m going to do this. I’m in total love with your wall color too, what is it?
Thank you, Ashley! Our wall color is Babbling Brook by Olympic {sold at Lowe’s}. It’s sooooo pretty–even prettier in person!
Such a graphic hit of bold colour Tasha- it looks amazing with your wall color too!
Thanks, Krista! I still can’t get over how much of a transformation it made. I can’t wait to tackle all of my doors :)
Hi Tasha,
First time here and so glad I found you! We had the same [unfortunate] color in our previous house. We referred to it as our skin covered walls. If I stood against the walls in my birthday suit you wouldn’t be able to see me. Nasty! [the color as well as the ‘lovely’ visual]. Anyhoo…thank you for the inspiration. I’ve been holding off painting my interior doors black, but that’s it…I’m goin for it!
Hi Amy! Thanks so much for reading my blog! I can’t believe someone else had to deal with that UNFORTUNATE color! Ugggghhhh! You should definitely go for the black doors. I can’t wait to paint all of our interior doors. It just looks amazing! Have fun!
Love this look! We’ve been thinking about changing our interior doors to black but wasn’t sure how it would look with the white trim–after seeing yours I’m convinced! Curious did you do this with your bedroom doors and did you paint both sides black?
Thank you, Jenn! I have not yet painted our bedroom doors, but plan to and will definitely paint both sides black. I hope that helps!
Love the black and white! Can’t wait to see your kitchen reveal.
Thanks so much, Glenna! We are getting very close to finishing!
Looks great!!! I’ve been wanting to do this to our front door, too!
Thanks, Selene! I love your wood grain tiles in your kitchen. So pretty!
It definitely looks much better…I am currently working at painting out all my 90’s oak trim/windows/cabinetry into white – every finish in my house is in oak trim . Finished my MB and the hallways and it looks fabulous. Looking forward to seeing what you guys end up doing in your kitchen…kind of been stalking your site to see if you have updated it yet:)
LOL, Tammy! I love blog stalkers :) The reveal should be coming in the next two or three weeks at the most :) We still have to build our kitchen table and just need to find time to do that. Isn’t it exhausting to paint trim? But it’s so, so worth it! Glad you are having the same experience.
What a big change! I really love the black color of that door now!
Thank you, Stephanie! Eventually we will paint all of our interior doors black. You know, in all of our spare time :)