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Create Gorgeous Curb Appeal with Front Door Colour Ideas

By 04/09/2019April 17th, 202025 Comments

Updating your front door is an easy way to energize the outside of your home. Here are some front door colour ideas to help you create gorgeous curb appeal. 

We just arrived in Atlanta for my second Specify Colour with Confidence workshop this Spring (it starts tomorrow).

After we left Toronto, we flew to Little Rock for a meeting and yesterday before our flight back, we drove around and I snapped a photo of this blue grey house with crisp white trim and a fabulous red front door because I love the way the homeowner planted matching Azaleas out front.

Get a similar look with Sherwin-Williams 6587 Valentine

Nothing brings grey to life faster than a striking colour like red! And red is trending again.

A new front door colour is the perfect home update for spring.

Spring is the perfect time to update your front entrance. To bring some new energy and curb appeal to your home after a long winter.

It’s a relatively easy but impactful project. But I suspect that people generally spend a lot more time spinning in circles deciding on the right colour for their front door than they do actually painting it.

My front door posts are always among the most popular. People clearly shop for front door colours online, so I thought I would give you some new inspiration since it’s the right time of year.

You really do need to take the surroundings and the colour of your house into consideration to find the perfect colour. You can push the clean and dirty rule a little bit with a front door colour, but if you go too clean on a taupe, or beige, brick or stone house, it won’t look harmonious.

Front door colour ideas if you have an earthy exterior colour palette.

In general, it’s a good idea if you have an earthier exterior, to look for a much more muted or “dirty” version of the colour you like to test for your front door. Trending deep forest greens often work well for brick and stone houses (below).

 

For a similar look try Sherwin-Williams 2847 Roycroft Bottle Green Via Apartment Therapy

Green front doors connect readily to the landscape, so they tend to settle in and look right at home. And different greens play well together.

If you have an earthy house, often all greens and some white or cream looks best for plantings. But you can also use some richer golden yellows, rusty oranges, plummy purples and deep burgundy reds in your planters and landscape.

Muted eggplant is another good front door colour to try with any brick, stone or earth-toned house. There are lots of pretty purple and violet flowers you can plant to coordinate.

Muted Eggplant Front Door Colour Idea

This Old House | Farrow & Ball’s Brindjal

And if you like blue, you may be able to go with a more subtle slate blue with an earthier house like this below.

For a similar look try Sherwin-Williams 8148 Azurite. Image from Home Stratosphere.

Where should I start when trying to choose a front door colour?

Fresh exterior schemes can be accented with almost any colour you love. If you have a lighter colour on your exterior, with white or cream trim, you have a lot of options for your front door colour. Too many maybe — meaning it can be hard to narrow it down.

One place to look for inspiration to spruce up your front entrance is to your interior colour palette. What do you see when you first step inside the door?

But what if decorating your interior is the next project? And right now, your front entrance is really what needs love?

Ok, if you’re not sure where to begin, you can arrive at just the right colour by picking out some decor for your front porch FIRST. A pillow for a chair or bench, or a colourful outdoor rug is a great starting point for choosing a front door colour.

Often, all it takes is repeating the front door colour with vibrant flowers in your landscape and/or planters to create gorgeous curb appeal with a fun new front door colour.

I had fun putting together some inspiration boards, complete with sourcing links below to help inspire you to refresh your front entrance for spring.

Orange Front Door Colour Ideas

Sherwin-Williams 6883 Raucous Orange

SHOP: Pillow | Chair (Similar, Similar, Similar)

Here’s a vibrant orange outdoor accent pillow I found on Etsy. Rattan furniture of any kind is on trend right now, especially outdoors. It’s both classic and casual. This chair is from Lulu and Georgia, you can shop similar ones here, here and here.

A combination of vining nasturtiums and succulents would look great with this hot orange to complete a brand new look for your entrance.

>> Click here for my recommendations on the most classic outdoor wall sconce lighting

Cerulean Blue Front Door Colour Ideas

Benjamin Moore Chicago Blues 804

SHOP: Pillow (Similar, Similar) | Chair (Similar, Similar)

True blue flowers are hard to find, but there are some. Some varieties of delphiniums and hydrangeas are quite blue. But you don’t have to match them perfectly. Any flowers in the blue range will read as a nice repeat of this pretty blue.

This pillow is also from Etsy, you can find similar ones here. And, this classic weathered wicker chair is sold out at Birch Lane, but you can find similar ones here and here.

This kind of clear blue happens to look lovely with fresh green foliage anyway. A large fern in a classic black planter is one of my favourite simple solutions for a front entrance planting.

Black Planter with Fern Front Door

 

Deep Green Front Door Colour Ideas

Benjamin Moore Dragonfly AF 510

SHOP: Pillow (Similar, Similar) | Chair

This door colour is a beautiful twist on forest green with a bit more teal to it. BM Dragonfly is in my updated VIP Collection of colour boards.

Deep greens look amazing with almost any flower colour. Dragonfly picks up some of the pretty blue greens of blue hostas and looks great with warmer greens too.

I really like this colour with a bit of black and lots of white. The outdoor chair from Williams Sonoma Home looks very upscale.  I also found this pillow on Etsy, here are similar ones.

Rosy Pink Front Door Colour Ideas

Sherwin-Williams 6570 Haute Pink

SHOP: Pillow (Similar) | Swing Chair

Pink front doors are trending like never before. It’s so great how the world has opened up to this fresh and romantic colour. I would not be able to resist pairing it with old fashioned pink roses. Maybe climbing ones.

And how fun would it be to have a swinging chair on your porch? Well, you can snag this one here. Find this pillow on Etsy.

Rich Violet Front Door Colour Ideas

Sherwin-Williams 6839 Kimono Violet

SHOP: Rug | Chair | Purple Pillows

Purple is one of my favourite colours for a front door. It’s a decadent jewel tone that always looks rich and luxurious. This purple is pretty clean, but as I said earlier, there are lots of muted, dirtier versions of purple leaning a bit more towards brown and grey that will work beautifully with earthier palettes.

This door colour was pulled from this colourful outdoor rug that you can find here. The modern outdoor rocker is perfect for the porch from Williams Sonoma Home here.  And one of my favourite purple flowers is heliotrope, they smell amazing.

Are you planning to paint your front door soon?

If you need more help and would like me to layout some beautiful front door colour options for YOUR house, just use my convenient Front Door Colour eDesign Consultation.

Jo Chrobak, an interior designer and architect, came all the way from the UK to my Toronto course! She had been following me for years and finally this was the right time!

Photography by Ella White 

This is the note she sent me after the course:

Having professional architectural and interior design training means that everyone expects you to just be good with colour.  Yes we have an ‘eye for design’, but that doesn’t mean we get it right 100% of the time.  

Thanks to this unique and totally original way of looking at colour that Maria teaches, I can now say that I can get it right every single time and I can confidently back up my argument with facts rather than fluff.  

Thank you for helping me see colour in such a unique way.

Register here.

Related posts:

10 Best Front Door Colours for Your House

The Best Way to Choose a Front Door Colour from Palm Springs

An eDesign Front Door Colour Transformation; Before & After

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25 Comments

  • Mary-Illinois says:

    I just wish I could paint my front door! ?

  • Barb says:

    So happy to read this. We are having a new red front door installed on our gray house today!

  • Maggie S says:

    Great information …as always! Seeing the decor choices is a great way to really make the color pop!

  • Laura says:

    Absolutely take into effect your area and neighborhood! Inspired by the homes in New Orleans, a friend of mine painted her Victorian townhouse door, located in a classic, very preppy, northeast neighborhood, a shade of purple. In New Orleans, it would have been great but in her area, it read ‘frat house’, ‘off campus college students’ or ‘hippy’.

  • MIneral says:

    I think that first front door color matching the azaleas looks awful – like matchy matchy furniture sets. And it makes that beautiful weeping Japanese maple, which is probably normally the star of the yard, look dirty. Perhaps matching that Japanese Maple would have been better for year round knowing the azaleas are beautiful enough to hold their own when they are blooming. Just my thoughts…..

    2
    • Rhonda says:

      That wasn’t my favorite front door, either. My landscaper told me to chose plants/flowers that were complementary to the house color, rather than trying to match. Two different looks, I suppose, according to one’s taste.

    • Val from UK says:

      I thought the same. And the azaleas are in bloom for relatively short time.

  • Rebecca Burlingham says:

    I need to repaint our front door, which is mullioned glass at the top half. The house is an orange recycled brick. I have been trying to come up with a color that will go with the black roof and white trim. I’m tired of the boring black white and red look. I like the deep green you show here. What about something a bit lighter and more blueish. Not turquoise, but a muted green blue? The storm door, which is necessary, is white, would you leave it white, as the trim around it is white, or paint it blue, too?

    • Tamara says:

      It sounds like we have similar brick. We painted our door and shutter a fire orange color. It looks amazing.

    • teresa says:

      Paint the storm. It’s not really something to accentuate and with it white that’s all one would notice. the trim can probably stay white.

      • Rebecca says:

        I may do that, if I can convince my husband. there is a thin trim around the door that i will paint, too. That way whatever color I choose has the most impact.

  • Rhonda says:

    Ohhh… going to order those pretty teal pillows for my wicker rockers on my front porch. Will look great with my SW Rookwood Blue Green door, flanked by two variegated dark green/silver mother-in-law tongue plants. Nothing like a welcoming front porch!

  • Lucy says:

    Nice ideas but for me it is a little too matchy! I like shades of green with any front door color! Yes you could bring a couple pops of color to match the door but too much is too much! Just IMHO!

  • Gina says:

    I really enjoyed the beautiful examples of front door colors, but it got me thinking… Where I live in Southern California, many of us have steel security screen doors in front of our front door, and they are usually black or white. If we want to paint them a different color, we need to use spray paint to prevent rust. Would this issue perhaps be good for a future post with inspiration pictures? Any thoughts from commenters? ( I really like having the security door as it allows light and air to enter through my narrow hallway entryway… I have an unusual house layout and there are no windows On that side of the house for my living/dining area)

  • Korina says:

    My front door needs paint but…I can’t decide so for now am going to go for same as trim. House is painted BM Hawthorne, trim is Mayonaise. But…we have as orange/red roof, which also needs to replacing. The yellow is a new color so one thing that I think will be super fun…how totally different all the flowers I planted will look. Previously the house was a sad dark, blue. So the values are totally different. I have already started adding a lot of white flowers, but hated them with blue color. I have a ton of soft pink flowers, hoping it will be romantic.

  • Michelle T. says:

    LOL, my front door has been forest green for 15 years! I’ve always loved Forest Green and have it represented in my home in varying degrees since it was first popular back in the late 90’s. In fact, my grown 26 y.o. daughter now has my old Forest Green sectional in her condo, and she loves it. She’s right on trend with a hand-me-down, lol. She picked fresh wall color in SilverPoint paint by Sherwin Williams, which is a lovely LIGHT gray with a hint of steely green. Her place looks youthful, bright and current. An amazing number of colors look good with Forest Green, so she will be able to change out her secondary “software” as time goes on to stay fresh.

    Maria has helped both of us see the undertones and choose paint wisely. We don’t have a lot of money to make mistakes! Thank you Maria!

    P.S.: Can someone please tell me how to post my photo in the avatar box?

  • Joanna says:

    My favourite is the pink! How dreamy! I’m unsure of whether it would suit a cottage style better than a rancher though. Do you think it would be complimentary to a green beige siding?
    You are getting a name for yourself internationally. Perhaps, you should host seminars in Europe. Wouldn’t that be an adventure, Maria?!

  • Lynne says:

    I have a magenta front door. It makes me smile every time I come home.

  • Sandy says:

    What a nice letter!

  • teresa says:

    What a great post!I’m still conflicted on whether or not to paint my natural dark oak on my old “georgian” house. I love the roycroft green and am using it for fencing instead of black. You gave some great choices for earth-toned houses. It drives me nuts when I see doors that totally clash with the rest of the house. Too much pinterest and no regard for undertones especially with dirtier toned houses. One can still have the colour family, just not the exact colours often shown. You help people get it right the first time. Thank you!.

  • Deb says:

    Our dilemma is our siding is an ugly pink-beige which gets a LOT of coverage on your blog (literally, lol.) It’s probably considered taupe but either way it’s bleh! The original shutters were a medium muted green. (The original owner liked beach colors.) We painted the shutters black and honestly on a cloudy day the siding looks more tan. Back to the front door… it’s metal and was faux painted to look like wood. After seeing all these painted doors I’m intrigued. Thought about black recently but would love other opinions. Do I just re-faux the wood look? Ideas?

  • Whitney says:

    I clicked to see if you included my favorite door color, and you did! Purple is wildly underappreciated.

  • Kim says:

    Love all these gorgeous front doors! We recently repainted ours SW Dishy Coral and it makes me happy. Fun to have a cheerful entry door ?

  • Kathy says:

    Very pretty suggestions, and I was pleased that the fabric I chose for accent pillows in my rental is exactly like the one you picked for the green BM Dragonfly door. Except it is in rust/burnt orange. I love the pattern and batik feel, and the fabric is sturdy and has a lot of depth to it in person. I might even buy the pillow covers on Etsy (they come in orange as well as teal) and save the fabric for slipcovers. Thanks!

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