Custom Front Doors

Sleepy

Our house is part of an Architectural Conservation Area which means that the doors and windows should all be original. Sadly, the previous owner of our house installed a cheap and nasty PVC door prior to the road getting this designation. Am I correct in thinking that the only way to get an "exact" match for the doors on our neighbours houses is to commission one from a carpenter thus limiting us to having the door made out of hard wood?

As the change was made before the designation, we're not legally obliged to match the original 100% but I'd like to get as close to it as possible although for energy efficiency I believe I'd be much better off going with a composite door? Is it even possible to get custom work done that way though? Or is it insanely expensive to do so?

What the doors are supposed to look like:

The Princess Bride

Sleepy I got a composite door 5½ years ago and it looks exactly like your pic, except not yellow!
I can PM you the details anyway, if you'd like to have a look, but nowadays it's easy to get energy efficient and aesthetically pleasing without blowing a budget on custom made.

Sleepy

Took a look at the site you PM'd me but sadly neither their Apper nor their Palladio range has an exact match (the Palladio Dublin model is very close but the lower panels are different and the window panel seems slightly smaller). Ridiculous I know but Mrs Sleepy has her heart set on a yellow door and it's not one of the colours they offer in that model.

I suspect this will be my problem - finding something close enough to the neighbours that it doesn't look out-of-place as the composite doors seem to be made from moulds and I'd imagine getting a custom mould made would be an astronomical expense...

Can modern wooden doors come close to the energy efficiency offered by composites?

Lumen

Sleepy wrote: »

Can modern wooden doors come close to the energy efficiency offered by composites?

Not really, but I'm not sure it's that important, it's a relatively small area. The difficulty is going to be getting those sash bars (is that what they're called) to look right with double or triple glazing.

That said, the issue with wood is dimensional stability, which has implications for long term draft sealing.

I was up at McNally joinery a few months ago and they will do a lovely replacement in Accoya (acetylised softwood) with whatever glass you want, which has fantastic long term durability and stability, and looks great painted (you can have a different colour inside and out). If you want it to look proper then some heritage double glazing might be possible.