Oil Rubbed Bronze Glass Door Knobs for Less

I don’t know about you, but I love the look of oil rubbed bronze glass door knobs! They add so much character to a space, and in my opinion, they look a lot better than the builder-grade brass door knobs that most houses come with. 

When it came to our master suite, I knew I wanted glass door knobs, but glass door knobs are EXPENSIVE!  I couldn’t find any oil rubbed bronze glass door knobs online for less than $25, and I needed six sets of door knobs!  One for the master bathroom off of the bedroom, one for the door that leads to the separate toilet area, one for the master closet off of the bathroom, one for the linen closet just off of the master bedroom, and two for the French doors as you enter the master bedroom.  One of those French doors has a dummy door knob, so I actually needed five door knobs and one dummy door knob.  Yep, this was going to be expensive unless I came up with a plan. 

Well, I did come up with a plan.  While shopping around for glass door knobs, I noticed that the brass glass door knobs were a fraction of the price of the oil rubbed bronze ones.  I also remembered my ORB door knob project that I did a few months ago.  Are you putting two and two together yet?  If you keep up with my blog, you know several months ago, I redid our builder-grade brass door knobs by spray painting them oil rubbed bronze.  It was a very successful project!  You can find that post here.  Basically, my plan was to buy brass glass door knobs and spray paint them ORB. 

It sounded like a fabulous and simple plan in my head.  I wish I could say that this project was a cinch, but there were a lot of unexpected problems that I came across as I worked on this project.  Live and learn I guess.  Here’s how I managed to pull this project off……

I bought five of these  glass door knobs on Amazon for $8 each.....

.....one of these glass door knobs for $5 to replace the dummy door knob on one of our French doors...

…..and one $8can of ORB spray paint from Lowe’s. 

Quick Side Note:  By switching out the builder-grade door knobs to these glass door knobs I forfeited having locks on the new door knobs.  It’s hard to find locks on any glass door knob, and the cost is much greater for glass knobs with locks. 

I set out all of the brass pieces of the door knobs that needed to be painted on a large piece of cardboard.

I spray painted the caps of the door knobs.

Then I taped the glass knobs with painters tape…..

…..and painted the brass part of the knob.

When the paint dried, I took off the tape and it looked like this. 

FYI:  Some people prefer to use a spray primer before they apply the ORB spray paint. I didn’t use any primer, and our door knobs that we painted several months ago are holding up well. My husband and I live alone though. If you have kids and your house gets more wear and tear, you may want to try the primer before applying the ORB.

The door knobs that I bought off of Amazon came with these…..

…..but they were sized a little bit different than the ones from my original brass door knobs.  I painted my original ones ORB and used them instead of the new ones, since the original ones already fit perfectly into the door frame.

Now for the first real problems that I ran into with this door knob project.  My new knobs came with these.  I discovered that in order to make them work in my door, my husband needs to carve out a piece of the door to give them the perfect fit and make them functional with the rest of the new door knobs.  We have the tools to do this from all of the doors we replaced in our last house, but the hubs is not fond of home improvement projects.  Since I had him updating our guest bathroom this weekend, I didn’t have the heart to make him do all six of these doors too.  We will need to do it some point and time, and when we do I'll give these a coat of ORB paint before they go in the doors.

In the meantime, I am using the original piece that came with our builder-grade door knobs.  It’s actually a little loose with my new knobs. It does work, but the problem is that we can only turn the new door knobs one way with this original piece.  For now, this is just a quick fix….it’s not a long term solution.  When the hubs carves out all the doors, this problems will be solved.  Unfortunately, I know my husband, and it could be a year before that happens;)

The second problem that I ran into was with the dummy door knob for my French door.  I thought that the builder-grade dummy door knob came apart into several pieces, and I had planned on using the plate from my builder-grade dummy door knob to put on my knew glass door knob …..however, the plate did not detach from the knob.  To fix this little problem, I had to go to Lowe’s and buy a set of door knob plates for $2.50.

The next problem that I ran into was once again with the dummy door knob. There was no way for ther plates that I bought from Lowe's to screw onto the glass door knob.  This was an easy fix though. I attached the plate to the knob with some epoxy glue that I had on hand.  Problem solved;)

What was supposed to be a one hour project ended up consuming most of my Saturday.  But I have to say that it was totally worth it!  I LOVE the character that these glass door knobs give our master bedroom!  And I LOVE the price that I paid for all six of them!  The lesson to be learned here is "if at first you don't succeed, try and try again":) 

Let’s total up the cost of this project: $40 for 5 brass glass door knobs, $5 for one glass dummy door knob, $8 for one can of oil rubbed bronze spray paint and $2.50  for a set of door knob plates.  That brings the total cost of this project to about $60!   Yes, $60 for 6 glass door knobs is a lot better than paying $25-$50 for one oil rubbed bronze glass door knob! 

Another home project complete!  Only a bazillion more to go…...or at least it feels that way to me;)




I'm linking to these parites this week:)

20 ORB Door Knobs for less than $20

        
           When Matt and I bought a foreclosed home in January, we knew we had a year of home improvement projects ahead of us.  After moving in and forking out all of the intial closing cost, our goal was to complete the following projects in one year's time: buy appliances, buy blinds, fix water damage in basement, paint the entire house, furnish and decorate the entire house, update bathrooms, redo kitchen cabinets, update all light fixtures and update all hardware.  Most of the things on our list are small cosmetic issues, but they have certainly consumed much of our time and money this year.  Year two will involve things like replacing the floors and doing some major landscaping.  Bigger projects will include fencing in the backyard and building a better deck and patio area.  And of course, long term projects include finishing the unfinished basement, but for now, we have plenty of smaller projects keeping us busy.
        We were recently at the point in our home improvement projects that we were ready to update the hardware.  We had twenty door knobs to update from brass to ORB, and at $15-20 a door knob, the cost of those door knobs really adds up.  It would have easily cost us around $300 to replace all of the door knobs. 
       BUT....then, I discovered ORB spray paint!  If you'v been around blog land for awhile, I'm sure you've heard of this stuff.  But for those of you who haven't heard about it, I know what you are thinking....spray paint really?  To which I reply....YES, really!  Two cans of paint covered all twenty door knobs.  At $7 per can of paint, two cans of paint cost as much as replacing one door knob.  That's a savings of 95%!  I'm sure your wondering if it looks as good as the real oil rubbed bronze door knobs.   Well, you can tell a slight difference if you hold up the painted door knob to the original - I found that out when I painted one door knob and took it to Lowe’s to compare - but the difference isn't noticeable to the average person entering your home.  In other words, no one is going to notice you used spray paint unless you tell them.  In my mind, that made this spray paint project a huge success! 

I spray painted the door knobs oil rubbed bronze using Rust-oleum spray paint from Lowe's.

Tip: toilet paper tubes help keep the door knobs in standing postion for painting.

After painting one door knob and liking the results, I took off all twenty door knobs and got them ready for their paint job.

Good bye ugly brass......Hello oil rubbed bronze ;)

After letting the door knobs dry for several hours, they were ready to go back on the doors.

I love the updated look, and I think this project turned out pretty good.

Yes, pretty good indeed!  $14 beats $300 any day;)