Our recent Willowbrook exterior painting project was a literal change in scenery – Blue Door Painting refreshed the entire exterior of this beautiful home, helping it to stand out against the crowd and remain bold in the coming winter months.

Though it may seem counterintuitive, autumn is a great time to touch up or completely redo your home’s exterior. Summertime is great for outdoor projects, but fall has fewer insects, less pollen and a more temperate climate to work with. Not only that, but getting a facelift before the snow comes can help your exterior survive some of the harsh side effects of a Chicago winter.

For this home, the owner was keen to create a unique look. The deep, warm Country Redwood Arborcoat Stain by Benjamin Moore was a bold choice that matched the wood and stone accents already present on the house.

To help the red pop even more, we lined the windows with Ashland Slate trim, also a Benjamin Moore Arborcoat Stain. This shade lives in a family of dark grays, but the purple undertones give it more depth than a flatter, more straightforward choice.

In just five days, we took a nice home that blended in with its neighbors and transformed it into a gorgeous statement piece in the subdivision.

If you’re ready to upgrade your home’s look, contact us today for a free quote. Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

Our September Job of the Month was close to home – literally! This gorgeous apartment was sold by members of the Blue Door Painting team, but not before a modern interior refresh.

The Avondale apartment already had a lot going for it – a great location, tons of space and natural light, as well as owners who had cared for it – but the key to fetching a good price from a buyer was presenting all the positives of the space itself.

Aside from choosing clean and attractive colors like Grey Cloud and Revere Pewter by Benjamin Moore to update the rooms, the Blue Door Painting team was careful to stage the home to highlight all the wonderful attributes that a new buyer might enjoy. Especially for those transitioning from renter to owner, the pride of ownership extends far beyond being able to choose paint colors, so it’s important to showcase all the elements that make your house a home.

When staging a home or apartment, don’t forget the basics – make sure the space is clean, organized and inviting before hosting an open house. Our interior design contacts would be the first to tell you to keep the details in mind; pillows, plants, curtains, even candles or fragrance can create a cozy, attractive atmosphere for potential buyers.

Sticking with bright neutrals wasn’t just about staying on trend – this also allows for buyers to better visualize their own tastes when viewing the rooms. Overwhelming reds or dark blues or any color that’s striking and bold might work for you, but your buyer might be turned off by the daring choice.

The formal dining room started off as a playroom, but you would never know! It was reverted back to its original purpose after clearing away clutter and setting up a more natural flow of traffic through the home.

Buyers are looking for a great bedroom, so it’s savvy to focus a lot of energy on staging an impressive master suite. In this space, the bedrooms were tricky because of the attic ceilings, but the team was still able to set up a demonstrative room with appealing aesthetics.

Don’t be surprised if you have to spend a little money on staging – pictures, posters, rugs and other decorative pieces might cost a few bucks, but they will add measurable value to your home. Because this space was attractive and move-in ready, it took only one day in the property listings to pull in numerous offers. Better staging = more offers, more offers = more demand and value.

Aside from paint and decor updates, it can’t hurt to refinish floors, touch up trim and update kitchen cabinets and other hardware like bathroom faucets. Lighting fixtures need a facelift? Invest in some updated options that cast the room in the best light.

Keep in mind the kitchens and bathrooms can make or break a sale. Swap that old bathroom vanity for a modern sink and add a beautiful backsplash to your kitchen for an instant revitalization.

All set on the interior? Don’t forget curb appeal. Freshly painted front doors and finished decks can present a tidy image of a home that will look great for years to come.

Selling soon? Contact us today for a FREE estimate so we can help you present the best version of your home to potential buyers. Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

At Blue Door Painting, we love using neutrals in decor and design. That said, we’re not afraid to take a home like our recent Ravenswood revamp and up the color quotient for a bolder interior look.

Our August Job of the Month started as a drab multi-level home that relied too much on beige and brown tones throughout the entire structure. Walls, floors, even decorative elements were so neutral that they all blended together. We teamed up with Jasmin Reese Interiors to create a color scheme that could make this home’s decor and style stand out.

To complete this interior job, we painted the living room, formal living room, staircase and the kitchen. The main color theme was a beige and dark brown side-by-side combination that stretched the entirety of the walls. We updated this to one color – Hazy Skies OC-48 by Benjamin Moore – to streamline the room and make the space look cleaner and more spacious. To do this, we first had to remove the chair rail separating the two sections of wall to open up a clean, cohesive surface.

The focal point of the main living room was a beautiful stone fireplace that was being vastly underutilized. We took the plain white framing and made a bold, black accent piece out of the entire portion of wall that housed the fireplace. The bright, contrasting decor added afterward really makes the accent stand out.

You’ll notice in the “after” pictures that the homeowners have impeccable taste in both art and furniture. This home is incomparable in its decor, with gorgeous paintings and art pieces, along with modern, stylish furnishings. Even their plants worked with the room when we were done with it!

Next, we brightened the staircase walls with Hazy Skies OC-48 by Benjamin Moore for a cleaner look.

Blue Door Painting is a five-star rated, highly experienced professional interior painting contractor that has been pleasing customers in the Chicago area for over 35 years.

We are experts in complete, full-service interior house painting for existing homes, gut rehabs, home renovations and new construction projects.

We hope you enjoyed this installment of our monthly Job of the Month Series. Stay tuned for more Chicagoland painting projects by Blue Door Painting!

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

At Blue Door Painting, we don’t just paint over the flaws – we restore and prepare surfaces before completing the color. A recent Lake Shore Drive condominium refresh required us to repair extensive existing ceiling damage caused by water leaking into the apartment. Our expert repairs not only made for a smoother painting surface, but they rectified an issue that could cause larger problems down the line.

Once we restored the ceilings to a perfect, like-new finish, we painted the whole home interior to provide a much needed update. Now the homeowners can sit back and enjoy the gorgeous lake views!

This one bed, one bath Edgewater condo has impressive views, so we wanted to give the interior an impressive facelift to match. The walls were an unappealing yellow shade, with mismatched decor elements. We updated the yellow in the main living space to a calming green – SAGE SW 2860 by Sherwin Williams – with bright white trim.

As you can see in the photos below, the water damage on the ceiling was considerable and spanned the entire hallway and into other areas of the home. After meticulous repairs, we updated the look with a clean white to match the trim.

In the foyer, we updated the existing yellow to the more subdued Ambitious Amber 6366 by Sherwin Williams. The brightness of this shade complemented the white trim, ceilings and doors to give the space an airy quality.

To give the bedroom a unique feel, we replaced the bright yellow with a relaxing shade of purple – Beguiling Mauve 6269 by Sherwin Williams. We also painted the metal radiators in each room to match the walls for a more cohesive look.

This full interior update has been one of our most extensive interior jobs this summer, and we’re proud to share the final product with you! Blue Door Painting is a five-star rated, highly experienced professional painting contractor that delivers quality interior and exterior painting services to condominium associations in the Chicago area. Contact Blue Door Painting today to get a free estimate for any painting project – we are fast, professional and affordable!

We hope you enjoyed this installment of our monthly Job of the Month Series. Stay tuned for more Chicagoland painting projects by Blue Door Painting!

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

Pro tip: paint your new space before you move in to simplify the process. Taking that advice, the new owners of a loft-style condominium in the West Loop wanted to brighten the walls and trim throughout the unit before officially moving in. They called Blue Door Painting for the interior job, and we left them with a fresh, modern update to match their sweeping city views.

The original color scheme relied on cream neutrals with dark accent walls. Blues and browns were abundant in this space, and we wanted to lighten not only the walls, but the atmosphere.

We went with White Dove for the trim and doors – this lovely, warm shade of white adds a little more character than pure white.

The soft, neutral tones – Rodeo and Stonington Gray, both by Benjamin Moore – are perfect complements to the apartment’s flooring and kitchen colors. The neutrality isn’t just trendy; the streamlined look provides ultimate design flexibility while keeping the incredible views of the city front and center.

The bathrooms were bold and dark, so we updated both with Hushed Hue, a simple but rich shade from Benjamin Moore.

Blue Door Painting is a five-star rated, highly experienced professional painting contractor that delivers quality interior and exterior painting services to condominium associations in the Chicago area. Contact Blue Door Painting today to get a free estimate for any painting project – we are fast, professional and affordable!

We hope you enjoyed this installment of our monthly Job of the Month Series. Stay tuned for more Chicagoland painting projects by Blue Door Painting!

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

We’re all about exteriors this season at Blue Door Painting! Our May Job of the Month features a transformative project in Old Irving Park, complete with an overhaul of the exterior color and a facelift for the front deck.

The structure of the house was beautiful, but the paint was faded, chipping and peeling away in prominent spots on the facade. The front, sides and rear of the home were looking worse for wear after a few too many tough Chicago winters, and we needed to smooth things out before starting the color update.

To properly prepare the home for this dramatic exterior rejuvenation, we thoroughly cleaned and pressure washed all the exterior surfaces of the home to ensure a long lasting, evenly applied finish. The Blue Door Painting crew then filled any holes and cracks with high quality elastomeric caulk and applied one coat of primer followed by two coats of Hale Navy HC-154 exterior paint by Benjamin Moore. The original bland, unobtrusive gray was consistent with many houses in the area, but the homeowner wanted more than just a spruce – they wanted to stand out from the crowd with a bold color choice.

To complete the look, we stained the mismatched natural wood grain of the front deck to a darker, complementary color. We also matched the top of the deck design to the home to give a more consistent appearance to the entry.

This Old Irving Park update has been one of our favorite projects this season, and we’re pleased to share a few kind words from the homeowner herself on the end result of our work:

“Tom and Ed were wonderful to work with, planning the project and scheduling the work. We had a whole house exterior paint job including deck stain. We changed the color of the house completely and they did a great job prepping and painting. I will use them again for sure and I highly recommend them. Oh, and their prices were very competitive and fair.” – Beth O. on Google Reviews.

Blue Door Painting is a fully insured and vastly experienced exterior painter. Contact Blue Door Painting today to get a free estimate for any painting project – we are fast, professional and affordable!

Hale Navy HC-154 Benjamin Moore Blue Door Painting Chicago

We hope you enjoyed this installment of our monthly Job of the Month Series. Stay tuned for more Chicagoland painting projects by Blue Door Painting!

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

Updating an older home can be a balancing act – maintaining character while modernizing the look. In this recent full interior painting project, Blue Door Painting took an outdated and worn two-story home in River Forest and transformed it into an alluring and inviting space.

Though the exterior was unassuming, the interior of this home was working with a mixture of everything from beige to yellow, green to grey. This client worked with a professional interior designer to streamline each space’s color scheme to be from the same palette. To achieve this interior continuity, we painted all the walls, trim, ceilings, bathrooms and even doors and closets with Benjamin Moore paint.

Starting at the front of the home, we knew immediately that the fireplace should be a focal point. This old wooden fixture had so much potential; instead of restaining, the designer selected a monochrome mix of graphite and white. Painted fireplace facades can bring a room together and give a decorator more flexibility.

Moving deeper into the home, the modern theme was carried through with grey variants. This, coupled with bright white trim, gave each room its own signature contrast while tying it together with the rest of the house. Everything in this home from the master bedroom to the nursery was given a facelift from floor to ceiling.

To minimize the look of the electrical outlets, the designer decided to paint the outlet covers the same color as the wall, creating an uninterrupted flow so the white trim could pop against the darker grey.

We completely transformed the old, worn staircase into a beautiful high point in the entryway. In keeping with the modern light vs. dark palette, we brightened the base and darkened the face of each stair. The balance is particularly noticeable against the backdrop of a neutral pewter on the hallway wall.

Most people stick with wood grain or white doors, but the homeowner wanted to complete the deep contrast; the kitchen entries and the front door were painted to match the fireplace and framed with bright, illuminating white trim.

Blue Door Painting is a fully insured and vastly experienced interior painter. Contact Blue Door Painting today to get a free estimate for any painting project – we are fast, professional and affordable!

Paint Colors Used for This Project 

We hope you enjoyed this installment of our monthly Job of the Month Series. Stay tuned for more Chicagoland painting projects by Blue Door Painting!

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

In this truly transformational project, Blue Door Painting was tasked with converting a dreary and dated Chicago River West two-bedroom condo loft into a modern and appealing rental apartment.

To achieve this major transformation, the Blue Door Painting team painted the entire interior of the home: walls, doors, trim, ceilings, closets and the kitchen cabinets. The color used throughout the unit was a lovely shade of white called Chantilly Lace by Benjamin Moore in a matte finish. The decision to use a single white color throughout is in keeping with the loft style of the dwelling and enhances the modern and open space yielding a clean, crisp feel which is perfect for a rental apartment.

The Before and After pictures of this project really tell the story. The small apartment was painted in a jumble of colors ranging from blue to purple, peach, green, beige and gray which created a feeling of chaos and confusion. The conversion to pure white complements the loft’s unique architectural elements such as the exposed pipes in the ceilings and gives the home a much brighter and larger feel.

The final and critical component to achieving the full transformation of the space was to paint the kitchen cabinets white and install new door handles. This single step brought the entire unit up to modern rental standards allowing the owner to charge higher rent and making the unit more competitive in the hot Chicago rental market.

PRO TIP: Painting kitchen cabinets is a fast and inexpensive way to bring a major update to your kitchen, saving you thousands of dollars and weeks to months of contractor hassle. Please check out our cabinet painting page to learn more about our quality cabinet painting and refinishing process for kitchen and bathroom cabinets. Below you can see a video showing whole cabinet painting process.

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This entire project was completed in 10 days (3 days for condo painting and 7 days for offsite kitchen cabinet painting) and cost $7,000.

Blue Door Painting is a fully insured and highly experienced condominium painter.  We work with the condominium board or management office to schedule the job within the hours allowed by the building and provide any requested certificates of insurance prior to beginning work. Call Blue Door Painting today to get a free estimate for your condo painting project – we are fast, professional and affordable!

Paint Color Used for This Project

We hope you enjoyed reading this post from Job of the Month Series. Stay tuned for other interesting Chicago painting projects by Blue Door Painting!

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspirations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s List or Houzz.

We are thrilled to share our February 2018 Job of the Month and couldn’t be more excited about this painting project to kick off our new monthly blog series!

When it came to selecting the job of the month for February, there was no question in our minds that this exhilarating and refreshing color update in a Chicago Logan Square garden apartment would be the winner.

Embracing bold color, our Client wanted to animate the wall colors in her living room, hallway and kitchen. This painting project is a testament to the power of color to make a home come alive, reflecting the homeowner’s singular personality and design sense.

PROPER WALL PREPARATION IS CRITICAL

Before applying color to the walls, the Blue Door Paintingcrew takes a number of critical site and wall preparation steps to ensure smooth, high quality finishes and a neat, splatter-free work area.

We begin by moving all the furniture to the center of the room and covering the floors and furniture. Beautiful wall color needs a smooth base canvas, so we sand the walls with light sandpaper to remove any surface imperfections and repair all cracks, holes and dents. You can read more about proper wall preparation in our previous blog post.

To ensure that the color intensity would come through vibrantly, our crew first primed the walls using primer and then applied two coats of finish paint. The colors used in this project are: Thundercloud #S520-5 by Behr, Fresh Artichoke #M340-5 by Behr and Provence creme #2021-60 by Benjamin Moore.

BEFORE AND AFTER INTERIOR PAINTING PICTURES

As you can see from the BEFORE pictures, the living room walls were previously painted in a mild light blue color. Our Client wanted to create a more dramatic color contrast to showcase her gorgeous yellow couch (LOVE IT!) as the room’s centerpiece and chose this stand-out blue paint – Behr Thundercloud #S520-5.

We tried to capture her impressive color selection process with the paint color swatches on the wall.  (PRO TIP: Getting paint samples and painting sections of your wall with different colors you are considering is a great way to see the color in your space, how it changes in different lighting and the scale gives a much better sense of how the color will feel in your home than just looking at a small paint swatch!) If you are less daring or are unsure what color to paint your walls check out our blog for inspiration or schedule a FREE COLOR CONSULTATION with our Interior Designer, Jasmin Reese.

To complement the beautiful new blue walls and yellow sofa, our Client wanted to brighten up the drab beige wall color in the apartment’s main hallway. Here she chose a lovely light yellow paint color called Provence Creme #2021-60 by Benjamin Moore. Notice the uplifting effect of the yellow wall color, making the hallway look bigger and brighter while providing a very pleasing contrast against the blue living room walls.

Finally, the last room we painted in this adorable apartment was the vivid blue kitchen. To balance the bold paint colors in the living room and hallway, our Client chose this calming and very grounding shade of green paint called Fresh Artichoke #M340-5 also by Behr. We think this was a wonderful final touch to bring all the colors together in balanced way.

We absolutely love this transformation, especially the way this terrific yellow sofa contrasts with the bright and bold blue walls and the unique design elements of this home.

We hope you enjoyed reading this post from Job of the Month Series and gained some inspiration from our customer’s incredible style and willingness to embrace bold color. Stay tuned for other interesting Chicago painting projects by Blue Door Painting!

Paint Colors Used For This Project

CALL US TODAY for a free painting estimate, color consultation and 10% PRE-SPRING painting discount!

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspriations and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s ListorHouzz.

We are excited to announce a new series of posts on the Blue Door Painting blog curating our favorite “Job of the Month”.  This monthly series will highlight unique customer painting projects that showcase technically challenging painting work, major home transformations, striking color palettes or out of the ordinary customer design aesthetics that we think are a great inspiration.  Look out for Blue Door Painting’s “PRO TIPS” as well where we can share painting best practices and our professional expertise.

Each post will outline the job location, specific paint colors used and our customer’s motivation and goals for the painting project.  We love reviews, so whenever possible we will let you hear from our customers directly too!

We look forward to sharing the diversity and quality of our work with you each month and hope you will find this new Blue Door Paintingblog series inspiring!

ADDITIONAL BLUE DOOR PAINTING NEWS

GET READY FOR SPRING! If you have been considering transforming your home with fresh colors, NOW is the time – take advantage of our special PRE-SPRING PROMOTION!

Book your interior or exterior painting project with us by March 31st and take an extra 10% off! Job must be booked by March 31st and completed by April 30th, 2018.

Don’t wait – schedule your FREE PAINTING ESTIMATE today!

Looking for some color inspiration? Check out our blog posts or call for a free color consultation with our Interior Designer and color guru, Jasmin Reese.

If you are interested in checking out our previous painting projects, please visit our painting portfolio.

Follow us on Instagram for daily inspriations and more pictures of our projects.  and read our 5 STAR reviews on Yelp, Angie’s ListorHouzz.