Porch Column Makeover | thesavvyseeker

There are certain aspects of original vintage home charm that I love, love, love…and other elements…um, not so much. Glass door knobs, YES! Original wavy glass windows, YES! Original creaky wood plank flooring, YES! 1960’s antebellum style turned wood porch columns….No no no! When we purchased our 1960’s brick colonial almost 7 years ago, the exterior need a major facelift. It had been painted pea soup green with dark green shutters and light green trim…including our lovely porch columns. The first year we were here, we had the exterior painted and decided to change the trim to classic bright white. That worked for a while, but still left me with a feeling that I needed to be sitting on the front porch in a giant laced hoop skirt, fanning myself, ready to serve our guests with a glass of cold sweet tea.

I’ve read a lot of articles online in the blog-world lately of folks adding faux wood beams to the inside of their homes. This got me thinking…what about adding that same rustic charm to the exterior of our home?

Not much to look at here…skinny white columns…yuck!

Enter the HGTV show Fixer Upper. If you aren’t already totally addicted to this show, like the Mr. and I are, then you will be as soon as you watch one episode. Not only are Joanna and Chip Gaines about the cutest, most lovable couple on the planet Earth…the budgets they work with to improve the homes they work on is realistic. The average American family does not have $1.5 million to spend on a vacation home in Bali, nor do they have $300,000 to renovate their modest suburban home. That’s why we enjoy Fixer Upper so much…their interior decor style is classic and comfortable, with a nod to vintage, and their renovation projects seem to be in the realm of achievable.

Here are a few snapshots we used for inspiration:

The Mr. and I kept noticing how the Gaines like to incorporate a rustic Texas style of stained wood exterior beams on their remodels. We wanted to use that as inspiration for our own porch columns, but without the heft price tag of completely ripping our current wood beams out and hiring an architectural team rebuild our porch structures. Luckily, we knew some local carpenters (Don’t Call It A Flip LLC). We showed them a few photos of what we were after, they were able to find a great price on some local cedar wood and knocked the job out in 1 day!! They simply built new porch columns AROUND our old ones, so we didn’t have to rebuild the structures from scratch.

Then the Mr. spent a 2nd day giving the new beams 2 coats of stain and sealer and VOILA…no more Gone With the Wind inspired porch columns. We used an exterior semi-transparent stain/sealer by Sikkens in Chesnut Brown. A gallon of this awesome stuff runs about $40-$45 at Home Depot.

Here’s the final product! Pretty awesome, huh?

Why did we wait 7 years to do this project? I have no idea. Sometimes you just need some inspiration to get the motivation you need to complete those DIY projects. Hopefully, this will show you that this type of project is affordable to easy to achieve…and if you are handy with woodworking, this project is totally doable in a few days. Now only if my garden would grow back so we have something to look at!

Hey ya’ll!! I’m still alive…I promise…though I might just be hanging on by the thread of a few crazy strings! I knew keeping up with a blog was going to be an entirely different game once our little girl arrived…and the challenges of being a working mom with a million hobbies has proved to be…well…difficult. There are lots of friends I haven’t seen, date nights that I haven’t been able to have, errands that don’t get run and small craft projects that just don’t get finished. And I’m learning…that it’s okay. I am also learning to just focus on the things that I truly love and that bring me peace and happiness…like playing and reading to my daughter, working on an occasional home project with my husband, spending the occasional Saturday visiting my favorite thrift stores with my husband or my parents. What also brings me happiness is my career. I thought that once I had a baby, that I’d have to give up on building up my professional life…but over the past year, with the loving support of my family, I’m able to have a happy balance. So…this year I’m also focusing on my design work, teaching and a few side projects.

So…where does that leave the blog? It’s still here and with a slight refresh. There are lots of fun home improvement things that we’ve been working on, as well as some fun family friendly antique treasures that have come and gone from our household. I’m going to probably write shorter posts about each of these things in the coming months…but there will be new articles coming!

Here are just a few things of inspiration lately:

Vintage inspired bathroom lighting updates!