What’s the difference between fingers and doors?

By Doorco’s creative consultant Jeyda.

Recently, I was minding my own business taking a photo of a red door with absurdly large lettering for the house number when a couple of women cautiously approached me.

I immediately thought my luck was up; I was finally going to have to confront the conversation I’ve miraculously managed to avoid so far as to why I’m taking a photo of someone’s doorway.

Fortunately, I was wrong. They were wondering if I wanted to be a hand model for their nail salon. Relieved and somewhat bemused, I decided to go along with it.

I followed the ladies to their salon where they sat me in a chair and offered me a whole array of different colours to choose from. Just like with doors, nails are an opportunity to add a splash of colour and show a hint of personality. It took me about 10 minutes to decide what colour to go for – even when the choice is far from permanent. I completely understand that choosing a colour for a front door, particularly a bold colour, is even more of a difficult a task. What if you don’t like it? What if the neighbours think it’s ridiculous? Naturally, I settled on fluorescent yellow.

There are a number of things I’d recommend doing if you fancy a bold colour but aren’t sure which.

First of all, get the brochure. Have you ever ordered something online and then it turns up looking like an entirely different product? Colours look different between print and online, so get the brochure to see the real colour you’re ordering.

Secondly, try the ‘Design Your Door’ feature on the Doorco website. It’s easy to think that you love a particular colour when you’ve seen it somewhere in the wild but that doesn’t necessarily mean it will look good on your door.

The biggest thing I’ve realised through my photography is that the story does not end with the door – it’s about the whole facade. The colours you love might look fantastic on someone else’s house, but perhaps with your surrounding brickwork it’s not such a pretty picture. With the Design Your Door feature, you can choose literally everything you want about the door and then visualise the end product by uploading a photo of the front of your house. A truly digital ‘try before you buy’.

Or, if you have a shed and fancy a more hands-on approach, my recommendation is to get some sample paint pots and try out your favourites. This is a safe spot where you can try out your most wacky ideas. I like to think my dad pioneered this technique by painting the shed door a lurid, fluorescent green and then, after clearly determining it to have been a success, moving on to the living room radiator (much to my mum’s dismay). Doorco can paint any RAL colour so you should be able to match your chosen shade.

If you are a developer or landlord with portfolios of properties, I envy the options you have in front of you. Rather than having to choose which colour to go for, you have enough doors to have a whole rainbow. What a fun way to avoid the frustrations often felt by residents of the uniformity of houses and being unable to put a unique stamp on a home. In fact, the property on my road has done this really well, turning an otherwise fairly non-descriptive set of flats into something eye-catching, memorable and full of life.

I find the different, bright coloured doors reminiscent of rows of beach huts by the seaside in summer and immediately feel happy when I see them. Consumers regularly say that colour is a key factor in purchasing and I would bet that anyone viewing a bunch of houses in a short space of time will remember the ones with a bit of character.

Thankfully, there is a huge amount of choice when it comes to choosing door colours. My personal advice is that being bold pays off, and I haven’t stopped admiring my fluorescent nails.