After weeks of work, I was finally in the home stretch of this custom door project for a Denver metro client. All that was left was fitting the door, installing the hardware, and painting the frame.
I started by trimming the door to its final width, tilting the saw blade roughly one degree off center to create a slight bevel along the edge. That angle lets the door swing shut cleanly without catching on the jamb.
For the hinges, I skipped the commercial jig. Since the existing jamb was staying in place, lining everything up with a standard jig would have been more trouble than it was worth. Instead, I drove out to the client’s house and used a marking knife to transfer the hinge locations from the jamb onto a story stick, then used that stick to mark the door back in the shop. A marking knife gives you a cut line that the chisel can drop right into. It is a much more accurate way to mark your work than a pencil.
Installing the door handle was more straightforward. The hardware included a drilling template, and I drilled from both sides of the door to prevent tear-out. I did run into a small snag when I realized I’d lost the spacer for my latch-pocket routing jig, but I decided chiseling it out by hand would be faster than making a store run.
For the finish, the S-curve running down the center of the door was getting painted black, with the walnut and copper left natural on either side. I laid painter’s tape along the curve and cut it with a razor blade to get a mask that followed the contour exactly. I sprayed the door in my spray booth, and once the paint dried, I scored along the tape edges with a razor before peeling it back so I wouldn’t lift any of the fresh paint with it.
The finished door came out exactly how I’d hoped; the black paint against the walnut and copper really ties the whole thing together.
I have installed Door locks of all varieties over the years, from different setback to full mortise locks. In this episode, I showed how to install a door lock and deadbolt set for my custom copper door project. This was a custom door for a client in Evergreen, Colorado, just outside of Denver.
If you are interested in learning how to build doors, check out my online woodworking course on how to build doors.
More Project Build Videos
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I show you how I veneered the center panel of the door with copper and walnut. I started by cutting the door's center core from 12-ply plywood. This ensures stability and resistance to expansion, contraction, or warping, providing a solid surface for veneering.
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