Interior & Closet Door Buying Guide

When selecting a new interior door, for your home, office, hotel or public building there can be a lot of factors to juggle. The best time to replace your hinged movable barrier is when you are planning a home improvement, home renovation, or remodeling project. Replacing your doors and windows serves a crucial role in dividing the rooms of your home, both physically, visually, and with sound protection. It can be challenging to find something that is both secure and visually attractive in the style of your home. From door placement to material, this guide is designed to help you select the best interior door for any room.

Types of Materials

Solid Wood

Solid wood doors can be made from a wide variety of woods, which makes a difference in the overall price. Hard and softwoods, including cherry, mahogany, alder, maple, pine, and others, are used often, although the most common solid-wood door is the 6-panel pine door. These doors are generally used on exteriors, but may occasionally be used indoors. At ETO Doors, we have a variety of solid wood materials such as Mahogany, Walnut, Knotty Alder, and Douglas fir.

Keep in mind that solid wood will shrink and expand with changing temperatures and humidity, so it’s best not to use solid wood doors for a bathroom, sauna, or another damp setting.

Solid Core

A bit different, solid core doors are designed like hollow core. However, they are filled with a type of wood fiber blend. They are not made of solid wood, but rather with an engineered filler product. This adds more sound protection and temperature control and tends to keep costs down a bit more than the real solid wood door.

Glass

As the name implies, glass doors are those with a wood or fiberglass frame and glass panes. We carry doors with single panes that run the length of the door, and doors with four panes, or nine panes such as French Doors.  Fiberglass, solid core, or wood and glass combinations are available and tend to allow for more beauty and light flow through the area. When used inside, these can be very modern doors for offices or dens.

Fiberglass

Fiberglass doors combine beautiful aesthetics with security and durability.  These doors come in a variety of wood styles, offering a sense of warmth with a more traditional style. Our Fibreglass doors feature more excellent detailing for a more natural wood appearance. Unlike wood doors, fiberglass won’t crack, dent, split or splinter. At ETO Doors, woodgrain fiberglass doors are available, or you can choose a white smooth fiberglass door that is sleek and fluid to the touch. Available in a wide variety of sizes and styles to work with the look of any home.

Types of Doors

Flush Doors

Flush doors are the most straightforward type of interior door. As one of the more common and inexpensive options, they don’t have any designs or detailing — they’re just an everyday piece of wood. This makes them usable anywhere in the home, and they can match any style due to simplicity.

At ETO Doors, we feature modern flush doors available as solid core doors. Most are still very lightweight to allow for easy hanging and use. You can complete them with a variety of stains or choose our white primed doors to paint. Choose what matches your home!

French Doors

French doors have a wood or metal frame around one or more panels of glass. These are popular for the classy and grandiose look and have a wide variety of designs to fit the style you’re looking for. The glass can be transparent or opaque, to add some privacy, but both still allow a flow of natural light to open up space.

Panel Doors

Panel doors are the most common type of doorway found in homes today and are made from either solid wood or composite materials. Usually constructed of panels, they come in many different designs and can be easily customized with paint or glass inserts. The core can be solid wood or other material, which affects the price and functionality of the door. When it comes to panel doors, ETO Doors boast of a range of panel doors with two panels, three panels, and up to 6 panels.

While still simple, these doors add more dimension than just a flush door, and can be quite stylish depending on how creative you get with your DIY projects!

Sliding Barn

A sliding barn door is stunningly functional with endless applications and has become quite popular in recent years. These are the ultimate space saver, making them great for smaller rooms or areas where swinging doors take up valuable space. Our single sliding barn doors are great for closets, bathrooms, pantries, offices, or areas where door swings could restrict movement. Each entry uses a small surface-mounted floor guide to help align and stabilize the door where it overlaps with the wall. We sell the hardware, and you can choose from many of our entries to complete the look you’d like.

Louver Doors

Louver Doors comprised of angled pieces of wood specifically designed to improve ventilation between closed spaces; however, they can also add a unique look to any room. They’re perfect for pantries, closets, furnace rooms, laundry rooms, and more. Our premium louvers feature hand-assembled craftsmanship and door components assembled with our high-quality stile and rail construction method.

Pre-Hung vs. Slab Door

Shopping for doors on ETO Doors involves choosing between two major door types: slab doors and prehung doors. Remember that all our doors can be ordered as prehung or slab.

A slab door is the cheapest, with some assembly required. Slab doors are just the door itself; they don’t come with doorknobs, hinges, or a surrounding frame. On the other hand, a pre-hung door comes with all of that already attached, ready to go into the doorway (making it the more expensive option).

Internal Doors Style Guide

Craftsman doors

Craftsman interior doors offer a unique style compared to most other entries. They feature panels that are aligned both vertically and horizontally, where most door styles stick to one alignment. This is a simple style that allows for a lot of customization, such as glass inserts or unique colors. Craftsman doors are usually rather affordable, but still, add something more than an essential plank of wood.

Rustic Interior Door Style

If you’re looking for aesthetics, rustic style is always a classic. Its simplicity makes it easy to use almost anywhere in the home, while the long vertical slats and aged look add character and class.

French Interior Door Style

French doors, as mentioned before, are well known and loved for their ability to separate two rooms while maintaining a very open and spacious feeling. The large panes of glass allow for proper insulation and noise reduction, and still allow a massive flow of light between rooms. They also have a very luxurious and classy style, always dressed to impress.

ETO Doors has an incredibly large selection of French doors, suitable for any home style or location. Not only that, but all of our doors are customizable to suit your needs.

Modern Inside Door Style

Choose from our range of quality modern inside doors, designed to enhance your home and complement your interior design. With a wide range of stylish internal doors to choose from, you can select by color, style, and material. You can select from glazed and unglazed interior doors, depending on whether you want to floodlight into a room or create privacy. Our range of knotty alder, mahogany, and internal walnut doors are exceptional and work perfectly in modern contemporary home design.

Measuring Guide

Before you start shopping for new doors, you will want to measure your current door to get an estimate of your doorway size. Getting proper door measurements for replacement is essential, so you know what to look for when selecting your new door, and so you have no problems during installation. At ETO Doors, we have dozens of door sizes to choose from, or we can have one customized just for you.

Height

Measure for height (H) from the sill to the underside of the exterior trim at the top of the door.

Width

Measure the width at the top (w1), center (W2), and bottom (W3) of the door opening. Use the shortest measurement when ordering if they vary. Record your door width. For double doors, order two doors and a double door kit.

Door swing and handing

• It’s essential to think about the swing direction and preferred handing of your new door.
• For inswing doors, if the hinges are on the left-hand side, your door is Left-Handed. If the hinges are on the right-hand side, your door is Right-Handed.
• For outswing doors, if the hinges are on the left-hand side, your door is Left Hand Reverse. If the hinges are on the right-hand side, your door is Right Hand Reverse.
• If you’re confused about the installation process or how to fix your pre-hung or slab interior doors, you can always reach out to our helpful door installation experts to work you through the process.

Creative Closet Door Ideas

Use Louvered Doors for your closets

This type of door resembles that of a shutter, like accordion closet doors. These doors allow enough air and light to flow through the cabinet, which helps keep your clothes fresh. If you want more detail, opt for designs that come with decorative panels. Choose louvered closet doors made of wood if you’re going to add more warmth to the space. These doors are also easy to maintain.

Make Use of Sliding Barn Door

Sliding closet doors are a great way to save space in your room. As long as you have wall space for the door to slide on, a barn door is an excellent option for a smaller place. Not only that, but they have a great rustic look with lots of character. If you’re having trouble finding a barn door, distressed wood doors are a similar option that can create the same look.

Closet French Door

If you want to give your bedroom some class that will never go out of style, consider installing French closet doors. These are great if you have some space and want to add some flare to the room. These doors should open outward towards the room and will leave ample enough space for you to be able to look into your closet. Our designers suggest adding molding to the closet door to frame them even further. You can make it stylish and chic by painting it with glossy white color.

Modern Glass Doors

Glass doors are awesome for contemporary-style rooms. These are sleek and minimalist, and can still provide privacy for your storage space with frosted glass. You can even frame these doors with wood, like a traditional door, and use layered glass just as quickly.