How to choose interior doors?

Interior doors form an integral element of a house. Not only do they add beauty to the overall look of the house, but they also call for many subtle necessities during their selection.

Newly creating or remodeling interior doors involves taking a few important factors such as style, materials, swing, and soundproofing into consideration. Learn how each of these factors plays an important role while choosing interior doors.

Door style

The style contributes remarkably to the entire design of a home. The color and texture can be mixed and matched to proffer a cool, eye-catching look. However, the other elements like shape and size need to be suitably chosen to maintain the same flow all through the house. For tiny rooms, massive decorative interior doors are beside the point.

Door swing

In general, right-hand or left-hand interior swings are chosen while positioning new interior doors or customizing already existing ones. The direction of the swing ascertains the placement of handles and hinges. It also decides the direction in which the doors open or close.  It needs to be made sure interior doors never have their openings inside a hall or lounge. So the swing of the doors should be set accordingly.

Door framing

Incorrect framing of interior doors can die down the worth regardless of them being expensive and beautiful. Inferior quality, cheap materials used for framing frequently cause damage to the door that may require costly repair or replacement in the long run. So, all the instructions should be carefully followed at the time of framing interior doors.

Door soundproofing

Sound Transmission Class (STC) is an important parameter that gives a measurement of loss in sound while transmitting across a door. STC is inversely proportional to the amount of sound passing through the door. By and large, when STC is lowest at 25, even a speech uttered in a normal tone is audible through the door. The median lies at 40. And finally, interior doors with STC more than or equal to 60 are perfectly soundproof.

Additional read: How to choose Interior Door Hardware?

Interior Door Buying Guide at Florida Lumber

Door materials

Frequently used materials for interior doors include the following.

Solid wood

A wide-ranging selection of wood can be used to make solid wood interior doors. The price varies with the type of wood which mainly includes mahogany, maple, cherry, alder, and pine. 6-panel pine interior doors are most commonly preferred. Since solid wood undergoes expansion or contraction depending on variations in temperature and humidity, solid wood interior doors are generally not preferred for bathrooms or to guard damp environments.

MDF

Medium-density fiberboard (MDF) is a kind of engineered wood majorly applied in paint-grade work. MDF interior doors have superfine quality. Usually, the production of such doors is done in separation either as MDF in their entirety or combination with normal wood. This makes way for a crisper look of the door and gives off the appearance of a wooden door when painted. MDF interiors doors are typically heavy and are known to provide good privacy as well as noise control.

Hollow-core

This type of interior door is generally made from molded composite wood or plywood. These interior doors are more affordable as their interior panel is hollow. Nevertheless, because of their hollowness, it is easier for sound and heat to pass through such interior doors.

Solid core

Similar to hollow core interior doors, the solid core variety is composed of an external skin formed of plywood or a molded composition. However, unlike the hollow-core doors, this type of door is stuffed with blended wood fiber. These interior doors perform better sound absorption and temperature control. They are however costlier than solid wood doors.

Metal and glass

Metal and glass interior doors are equally popular for both internal and external setups. Because of their smooth, glossy, ultra-modern look, they appear more stylish than the fussy solid wood doors. At times, they cost more than the majority of wood-combination counterparts. But, they are always more budget-friendly in comparison with solid wood doors.

Conclusion

Thus, it is evident that settling on the perfect interior doors to ensure privacy for your home and offer absolute noise control may seemingly be akin to choosing only a style, yet in reality, there are lots of considerations that need to be taken into account as discussed in this article.