Original Trim

I’ve been on enough old house tours to predict the reaction when the guide explains how some past owner painted all the wood trim white to “brighten up” a dark bungalow. Gasps all around. Well, I’m not ashamed to admit that we own one of those houses. Our trim work? Bright white.

You always hear about people who move into old bungalows and start off the restoration process by stripping all the white paint from the woodwork. We thought about that for about two minutes but decided that while there may be some nicely stained wood under the paint in the front rooms, the rest of the trim was probably plain pine—if not simply MDF. Of course, we don’t live in a Greene and Greene ultimate bungalow, nor do we have built-in book cabinets, inglenooks or china hutches. And don’t tell anyone but we like the fact that the inside of our bungalow is nice and bright. Given all that, it became less imperative we strip (and replace) all the trim and simply went ahead and chose wall colors that looked nice with white.

Nonetheless, I did have a twinge of disappointment as I started repainting the trim in the front bedroom.

I quickly got over it and continued with the painting.

It’s day four of the big snow so the perfect time for a project like this. We matched the existing color and brought home a gallon of oil-based paint (yes, that’s how long it’s been since the trim was painted.) We’re aware that most people would have painted the doors prior to installing new door knobs but that’s not how we roll.

Painting everything the same color all over again seems a bit futile but our woodwork was in pretty bad shape—a lot of dings and stains. After today, the front bedroom actually looks cleaner. It’ll be a slow process as we move from room to room but I’m thinking this project, almost more than anything else, will really make a big difference in our home.