If you are looking for a place to unleash your creativity, you can start with your garage door. Yes, you can start by choosing unique design options to enhance the curb appeal of your garage door. Among the wide variety of styles, overlay doors and stamped doors are the most common panel designs for garage doors.
Both stamped and overlay designs fall under the umbrella of carriage garage doors. Carriage-style doors are also called barn doors. This door style dates back to the 1900s when most homes had carriage houses to house their horses and buggies.
Carriage House doors have accent planking, decorative trim, window inserts, etc to enhance their classic look. They are no longer old-fashioned barn doors but come in a wide variety of finishes like wood grain finish, glossy metallic finish, etc. They can have wood overlays or stamped designs on their wood panels.
Whatever be the architectural style of your home- Victorian, Tudor, Spanish, Colonial, or Craftsman, the Carriage House style will suit it best.
Choosing between Stamped or Overlay garage doors
Garage door style and material
Stamped garage doors are classic steel doors with a wood grain finish. They have a design “stamped” or imprinted on their flush steel panels.
In Overlay garage doors, decorative panels are placed above the wood, steel, or composite panel doors. Since overlays are in use, you can experiment with a wide range of colors and finishes to create your artistic overlay garage door.
Durability and life
Stamped garage doors are durable and long-lasting as they are made of insulated steel. Overlay doors cannot vouch for long life as their panels might get damaged from time to time.
When you compare both types of garage doors, a stamped door. lasts longer as it is a basic steel garage door.
Pricing
Overlay doors have wood, composite, or metal panels laid over a basic frame. These panel design options are intricate and complex to fabricate. This increases the cost of the overlay garage door. In contrast, a stamped door is more cost-effective and hence the popular style of the garage door.
Maintenance level
Overlay doors involve a lot of exterior design elements like accent wood tones, window designs, decorative trim, etc. These exterior design elements are difficult to maintain and need the expertise of a professional garage door specialist.
In contrast, stamped doors have a minimalist design and are hence easier to maintain. Still, they need the services of a garage door expert if you wish to maintain their timeless style and finish.
Variety of options
If you want to experiment with a variety of carriage doors, you can start with their construction materials first. You can opt for steel, wood, glass, etc. If a low-maintenance material is what you are looking for, try vinyl or composite garage doors.
Coming to the design options, overlay doors can have raised panels.or recessed panels. Raised panels have beveled edges for visual appeal. Recessed panels are flush or depressed to give an appearance of depth.
Next, let us explore the extensive variety of colors and finishes. You can opt for paint-grade doors or stain-grade garage doors. In paint-grade doors, paint is applied on stain-quality composite or simulated wood garage doors. You can also try painting real wood doors if you want a classic appearance and do not mind the cost.
If you have decided on using a composite garaged door, you can give it a faux wood finish. You can reproduce the rich finish of real wood doors with faux wood tones in mahogany, teak, birch, or cedar wood grain finishes.
The other option which you can explore is stained doors. Here, a real wood door is gained to retain its charming appearance.
Even in the finish, you can opt for natural wood grain finish, glossy metallic, or mirror finish.
Be it stamped or overlay garage doors, both need proper installation and maintenance to retain their architectural appeal. Choose any of these carriage door style doors but always enlist an experienced garage door repair expert like Spark Garage Doors to install and maintain them. Give you a carriage house style door a hint of subtle sophistication by installing it in clean lines with the help of a dependable garage expert.
Call our garage door representatives at (303) 928-7200 to know more about our garage door repair services in Denver or to schedule your next garage maintenance service.
