Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

Which do you prefer - stained interior doors or painted?

We got one new interior door for our bathroom while it is being remodeled, and I have to decide what to do with it, which will determine what I do with all of the doors (once we get them!).

Thanks!

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

If you can afford it - I prefer stained.

I prefer stained wood molding as well. It just has a richer, homier feel to it (to me).

My brother and my mom have their interior doors stained and the moldings painted white - the door molding, baseboards, crown, window trim, etc... that looks pretty too.

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

I think it should coordinate with the molding in the room. Upstairs, we have painted floor, window and door molding, so the doors are painted. Downstairs, we have a lot of stained molding, so we will eventually have stained doors once we are finished with all of our projects.

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

Our doors and moldings are painted glossy white, i absolutely love white moldings, i have a friend who has stained moldings and her home is gorgeous as well.

I think its a preference, we have all wood floors throughout, no carpet, and we have a ton of molding in our house and i think our house would of looked a little too dark or to woody. We have thick moldings around all our windows, on the floor, around all the closet doors, we went nuts with molding

My friend that has all the stained molding has all tile/granite floors in her house, so i think that is why she can pull it off and we couldnt.

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

Well the house - as we bought it - has cheap, hollow wood doors - the kind that just are "wood" colored but really aren't either stained or painted.

All of the trim had been painted before (floor molding and around doors and windows) and are not in fantastic shape, so we just painted over them in white.

Eventually we will replace all of that too - but we are starting with the bathroom so I have to decide what to do with that door. Then eventually the other doors will follow....

My mom said to just paint the cheap old doors white and paint the bathroom door white so everything will match at first glance, even though the bathroom door is a nice 6 panel pine door.

I kind of like the dark door with the light trim as it is now look-wise (not the doors themselves)....

So many decisions to make!

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

I love both looks. It depends on your house style and the style you want. We have all white doors, base moulding, window moudling and when we put up crown moulding it will be white. But that goes with our house. I think stained doors and moulding are gorgeous and really had to your home. GL with your decision.

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

We have a really narrow hallway, so I am thinking that the white might brighten that up a bit... or do the dark doors white trim... so many decisions to make!! And I'm not even through the bathroom remodel!

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

If it helps you any - my mom has a really small hallway upstairs (where she did the stain plus white trim) and she stained the doors dark walnut (really dark) and has the white trim. It doesn't look too dark at all.

She also has a light color on the walls (BM Carrington Beige) and really light carpet so it's a nice contrast.

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

More good points to consider... our hallway floor is wood - right now a very light wood, because that is what we found when we pulled up the green carpeting. I would probably prefer a darker stain, but since it is in such great shape, we are keeping them as-is for now.

But ultimately I will want to stain them a darker color... so with the dark wood floors and dark wood doors and medium color walls (Sherwin Williams Trusty Tan) maybe white makes more sense....

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

i think it totally depends on the house style, your furnishings and your overall style....

for us it would be painted white but i have seen homes that are a different style that look really nice with the stain....

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

Painted white with matching moulding. I don't care for stained moulding/doors unless it's a main entrance or library/mans den.

Message edited 5/11/2009 1:14:35 PM.

Re: Interior doors - Stained or Painted?

All our interior doors are 6-panel pine doors that we stained and polyurethaned.