Stainless Doors Come to Those Who Wait

It's been a ridiculously long time since our front doors should have been complete, but as of August of last year they were still original and still looking crappy like this:

Well I'm happy to report that some serious strides have been made with the bottom door and the top door is now well on its way to become shiny and new. After being abandoned by our contractor we asked Alex (the guy who did our stairs and railings along with many other small metal related project around the house) to tackle the doors. Even with his glacial work pace it's been a better experience and will produce a higher quality product that going with the old GC, whose attention to detail and work ethic both raise serious questions about his competency in his chosen industry. But enough about that…on to shiny doors!

First we tackled the downstairs door, buying a high security metal door from the same sketchy Polish dude who sold us our wood flooring. These doors have 8 locking cylinders, 4 going into the wall you would think they would go to and the other two pairs going into the ceiling and floor respectively. Let's just say no one is getting past this door unless we invite them. Alex clad it in stainless steel and cut a hole for a small blue window. Right now the blue glass (same material as our glass wall inside) has plywood behind it instead of clear glass, so you don't get the full effect. We also need to touch up paint around the edges, but you get the idea

Here's the door from inside the apartment, where you can see the plywood and the custom stainless saddle that Alex made to keep the cold and the rain out.

The upper door has stainless trimming around the edge already but the actual door has yet to be replaced. We will be doing a solid wood door this time with three squares cut out (sort of like the door now, but the squares will be smaller and each one will have a blue window in it as well) Alex just installed the new side window and trimmed that out in stainless. The blue glass has yet to be installed here, so for now it is still see through and obstructed with some tape and shims holding the whole thing together until tomorrow. The top transom piece will remain clear glass but will get clad and finished up some more before the job is done.

From inside the tenant vestibule

Never fear, when the doors are done you will still get to enjoy viewing Alex's work here. He has a few more odds and ends to complete with us and then he'll be making us a custom steel and resin expandable dining table and chairs, the final missing ingredient in my plan for stellar dinner party throwing.