We are coming up to two years living in our new build home and slowly but surely we having been putting our own stamp on it along the way. The front of the house has been a slow and steady process and a little trip to the garden centre last week gave us the last little push we needed. Minus a few extra bags of slate at the front - I think I'm finally happy with how it's looking.
So, when we first moved into the house, the front door was a standard white door that everyone got and the front was badly turfed. We also happened to move the hottest week of 2018 meaning that the turf died no matter how hard we tried to care for it. Everything looked lovely and new but it definitely needed a little bit of something - we were also encouraged to plant on the front so the street looked generally nicer and so there was a semi circle under the window that wasn't turfed ready to plant into. I must admit, it was a while before we even looked at it though.
Our first attempt at making the front look a little nicer was to pop a little plant in. We wasn't keen on planting straight into the ground and decided on a little shrub, which would hopefully be low maintenance but add a nice pop of greenery.
We picked up this lovely wooden planter from B&Q as well as a shrub and some stones. As the semi-circle in the garden was just mud we decided to fill this is with some stones as a platform for the planter to sit on. Once the shrub was planted we also added some into the top of this just to tie it all in together. I was super happy with how this ended up looking and it definitely looked a little more presentable. The grass however, was still very patchy.
Next up, swapping the turf for slate. Unfortunately, when the turf was laid by the building company they didn't do sufficient prep work meaning the grass didn't grow evenly and was completely dead in places. We decided to completely get rid of the grass and swap it for slate. Now this isn't the best photo at all, as you can see some drive stones have hopped over to the slate, but it's the best I have from this stage. The slate again was from B&Q and was literally about £3 a bag and saves us hassle of cutting the grass every couple of weeks in the summer. We do however need a few more bags to bulk it out in my opinion which we will grab when lockdown has been lifted a little more.
Now, more to the present day. A trip to the garden centre last week (garden centres have reopened after being closed most of lockdown) made us pick up a hanging basket up on impulse and gave us the last push we needed to finish the front of the house off. I have been saying I want to paint the front door for months and months and never actually ordered the paint but getting a hanging basket gave me some fresh inspiration. I chose this lovely pastel pink and grey colour and Kallum picked the design (I originally wanted a traditional round one but he much prefered the cone). We also picked up some lovely pink flowers to go with it and just planted them and hoped for the best.
Then painting the door, a couple of neighbours much further round the estate had painted their doors pastel pink and I absolutely adored it - part of me wanted to do the same but I also wanted to be a bit different. I originally (many months ago) had wanted to go grey but something about a brighter colour was swaying me. After a long internet search I finally chose pastel blue and although homebase didn't have the exact brand I wanted, I did manage to get very similar in Culprinol Garden. I went for a pastel shade so it wasn't too in-your-face and I think it looks really sweet.
3 coats later and I was absolutely in love with how it turned out! The colour is really fresh and makes me smile every time I see it. Although it took 3 coats, the paint is quite thin so it barely even made a dent in the tin. The door didn't take too long to paint at all and I actually think the longest part was waiting for it to dry in between coats. All that was left to do was pop a new door number up and get a fresh mat as living on a building site has got this one looking worse for wear.
Before our little do up of the front - we just had little numbers on the actual door as they were cheap and cheerful at the time. I've always thought the plaques look a lot nicer though so knew eventually we would want one of those. A lot of the neighbours had the clear acrylic ones up since day one of living here and although I think they look really nice I did want something a little different. I found this gorgeous slate one on Amazon from a company called Active Window Films and loved it straight away! I think it works really well with the slate we've got on the ground.
With a door mat to finish - I'm really pleased with how it turned out and minus waiting for the actual deliveries, realistically it was just a couple of days work. (We dragged it out over months though!) I absolutely love this door mat from JVL Homeware and don't think I could have got a better match. It ties in the pink of the flowers and the blue of the door in perfectly in my opinion.
Just like that, we are looking much fresher and it didn't take -too- much effort. Now to decide what to do next.
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