The Wee Red Door

I was asked to make a wee door for a sketch about a key obsessive.
It had to have a keyhole large enough to fit a real key and should be able to open and close.
It was to be bright red and about 40cm in height.

Materials

 I bought some balsa wood (varying sizes and thickness'), red paint, hinges and brackets and an A3 sheet of thin foam.

I decided to begin with all the wood sections. That way I could work on the door facing whilst I waited for the primer on the wood to dry.

I measured out the length of the door on the 10mm thick balsa strips.
Once they were cut I glued 3 strips of that length together.

base

When measuring the base I had to consider the height of the door.
Also considering the wood I had left determined the shape I could make for the base; I made a rectangular base that would extend out a fifth of the height of the door - thinking to then sit a t-bar threshold (for want of a better description) across the top giving me a platform to attach the door frame to.
This should ensure the door won't topple.


The wood was primed and I moved onto working on the door facing.
 
I wanted to door to look wooden, like the old Victorian panelled painted doors, but I also had a limited time on this project.
 I thought it would look nice if the panels seemed like they were really inserted into the facing and had a little panel detail - so I made the outline facing from a layer of foam and painted a trim in.
Making the template for the facing design was a wee bit tricky. I had to measure my own door and scale it's panel dimensions roughly down to my door size. I made the template as a prototype before I used to measure the design onto the final foam layer.

marking up

the template for facing detail

 

With the foam cut to size, I primed it with a layer of PVA and pink paint.

painting's always the best bit!

When it came painting the finish on the facing, I put quite a bit of extra thick glaze into the paint and it left very fine paintbrush lines.I dry-brushed these very lightly in places, to highlight them a little. This all added to the wooden door effect.





When the paint was dry I added a little wooden trim by painting some highlights at the edge and a shadow where the trim ended.

 The keyhole was to be quite large to be able to fit a real size key. I was thinking this might be quite odd looking to have a small normal handle next to a rather large key hole. But if it needed to be done - I prefer to do it with gusto - so I made the key hole quite large and silver. It reminded me a little of Alice in Wonderland.

 When the frame and base were dry I painted a dark wood effect which complimented the colour of the door. The balsa wood I used for the frame was a little delicate so I added a layer of cardboard to it and painted it dark brown.

I attached the base pieces together and added the frame using brackets. The brackets will keep the frame in position.

The door - it opens..

All there was left to do was attach the door to the frame with hinges so it would open and shut. I was thinking at the time about how hard it was to hang a door for real. This little door was footery to allign the hinges to the frame.
I also spatter'd  a little red into the highlights - they looked a little bright.







I've probably said it before, but I can't stress enough how important it is for me to have good references to work from and equally important to search through good and bad to find the ones you want. The search gives you a clear idea of what works and what doesn't.
I was considering how easy it is for artists these days. References and inspiration are at our fingertips.
I live on google image search. The first thing I do before I make anything, is sit looking at images for a while.
If i'm designing the make myself, i'll quite happily flick through images til I feel adequately inspired.



I loved making this door. I got to try out some wood graining which i'd only played with before and realised how easy it is. I had a limited time schedule, so I just made the wood appear to have a grain, but if I had more time to spend I could have painted a specific tree grain.
I also got a chance to do a wee bit of  trompe l'oeil. It wasn't much - enough to give the appearance of a decorative panel. Again if i had more time to spend I would've painted in a more decorative edge.
I made this over 2 days and a quite pleased with the result.

finished wee red door :)