Dressing up the Foyer

First Impressions Entering Your Home

Do you remember the first time you walked into your home?   Was there something that caught your eye that made you think “why did the architect do that”?

After you move in and your surroundings become familiar, you tend to not see things the  same way as that first impression.  In my case, there were two things that I could not get used to and had to change.

When I first walked in to tour my home with the Realtor,  I entered through the front door and thought what on earth was the architect thinking when he placed the kitchen sink and trash compactor in the direct line of sight from the home’s entrance.

I knew that would have to change if we bought the house and I did do that with a relatively inexpensive solution.  Soon after we moved in, I had installed custom plantation shutters which I used as doors to divide the kitchen from the foyer.   When fully open, the doors are out of the way.  When closed, I can still enjoy some light through the shutters by opening the slats on an angle.

When we entertain, I close the shutters which helps me to direct our guests away from our kitchen and over to our wet bar for a drink before they progress to the great room for hors d’oeuvres.

On a daily basis, I like closing the shutters for privacy in the kitchen.

Additional Upgrades

For newer upgrades to the foyer, please see the Final Reveal of My Foyer from Week 6 of The One Room Challenge where I completely updated my foyer as shown in the picture below.

Metal Front Door Replaced with Glass Entry Door – Let there be Light!

The other change I made was to add natural light to our rather dark and small foyer. Since our foyer wasn’t very deep,  I felt I needed to replace our solid front door with a glass door which made the area feel less confining.  The original front door had two very narrow side lites similar to those shown in the picture below.

In order to bring in more light, I designed a wood framed beveled glass door with taller side lite windows to match the length of the door.

It’s as if our foyer doubled in size by extending our view outside.  The transformation was amazing.  I remember when the door was first installed, there was so much light pouring in that I felt like the front door was accidentally left open!

What changes did you make to enhance the entrance of your home?