DIY: A Sliding Barn-Type Bedroom Door

by Becky at Flipping the Flip

2 Materials

$100

Easy

There are a zillion ways to DIY a sliding door! Here's a fast, easy, under $100 way!

diy a sliding barn type bedroom door, bedroom ideas, doors, how to

Our hall bedroom, aka guest room, aka, that tiny tiny tiny room, is a conundrum. At less than 8 feet wide by 12 feet long, it's a toughie to make functional and comfortable for guests. We agreed: taking out the swinging door and installing a sliding door would free up valuable square footage.

Here's a "before" shot from the hallway side. Yawn. Not a terribly thrilling shot, but hey, before's are never thrilling, right?!

Here's a "before" from within the room. It's not a huge door at 30" but see how much space that swinging door takes up? The bed is therefore sadly crammed in the corner, our guests have no bedside table -- it's all around unfortunate. I'm tellin' you, sliding doors are the answers to the world's problems! (Ok, maybe slight exaggeration.)

After lots of research, I came upon this great track kit from Johnson Hardware at less than $60. Yeah, less than $60! Come visit my blog Flipping the Flip for all the details on this kit, valuable tips and lessons, as well as the whole process of installing the door at humboldtartdept.blogspot.com!

It was way easy to install by myself too. Can't beat that! A level, a few screws, the track is up. Attach a couple of plates to the door, add the wheels, then all you have to do is slide it on and enjoy the roomier room!

I purchased a plain old slab door and finished it myself. I painted the hall side to match the wall color, stained the edges then added a piece of stained corner trim as the pull.

But the inside of the room, I got creative -- I matched a piece of furniture I had stripped and refinished plus kept with the woodsy theme of the wall mural I had installed (two other great blog posts you need to check out!). I brought the neighborhood in by using a stick as the door handle. Yes, a stick! Can't beat free!

Here's an "after" view from the other direction. My goal was to make the hall side of the door not a visual stopping point for the eye. I wanted to keep the eye moving along the length of the hall so the focus is on the pluses, not on the dark, narrow, penned-in-ness of the hall. Bad sentence but you know what I mean.

"After" with all that room for giganto-dog Finn! The sliding door has made an incredibly huge difference in the room already -- it's amazing what just a few square feet freed up will do! Find out how you too can have a sliding door, free up square footage in your own home, and much more by clicking the blog link below!

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3 of 17 questions

Brian Wilson on Feb 24, 2018

On your blog you say the top is 1/4 off the wall in the track, that’s why you took off the casing. So how does it ride over the baseboard at the bottom which is protruding out another 3/4 of an inch?

3
Kathy Rothenberger on Mar 19, 2018

Why couldn't you use the original bedroom door and put it in the track?

1
Jennifer on Apr 06, 2018

dont you Just love German Shepherds as the Decor? We have 4!!!!🐾🐾🐾🐾

1

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4 of 115 comments

Melodi Whitaker on Apr 28, 2018

That looks great! I love the wall mural too😊
One suggestion to make the room feel bigger: It looks like the closet is on the far wall...I would take the closet out and put it on the wall opposite the door, to the right of the window. If you don’t need a large closet in that room, make it as small as you can. Then put the head of the bed on the other end of the room. This will allow more room when walking through the door, as well as allowing you to put the bed in the middle of the wall so small nightstands can be placed on either side. You can then put your dresser on the wall where the head of the bed is now.
I hope that makes sense. We had a narrow bedroom with the closet in the end and moving the closet helped so much.

2 Reply
- Becky at Flipping the Flip on Apr 28, 2018
  
  Thanks for the great idea! Part of our trouble is that the room is not even eight feet wide so everything becomes quite tricky in there. I will keep that in mind, thank you! Glad it worked so well for you!
  
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DebraY on Oct 02, 2018

I love the new door! The feng shui could use some help, turn the bed so the head is near the window and free up the sides for guests. Place a mirror on the wall directly across from the door.😄

1 Reply
- Becky at Flipping the Flip on Oct 02, 2018
  
  Thanks! The poor room is so unbelievably narrow, it's difficult to do anything in there. Thanks for the tips, I'll take a look!
  
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