Home Exterior Modernization “One Room Challenge” Final Reveal (Week 6)

The moment we have all been waiting for has finally arrived! The Big Reveal of our Home Exterior Modernization! Sit back and enjoy the abundance of pictures, I took a lot of photos and included a bunch for your viewing pleasure (and this is the scaled back version)!

Six weeks ago we started on a big outdoor home project. After talking about the idea for the longest time, we finally decided to bite the bullet and paint our brick house white. Our home is 100% brick top to bottom on all sides; no stone, no siding, no stucco….ALL brick….and there’s a LOT OF IT! The One Room challenge provided me the perfect  opportunity to get this project completed within a six week timeframe and I am thrilled to report I got it done and we couldn’t be HAPPIER with the results!!!! 🙌🙌

What Is The One Room Challenge?

The One Room Challenge™ is a biannual event every April and October and is currently in its sixteenth season. Each round, twenty design bloggers take the challenge and transform a space. Every Wednesday, the designers document their process while sharing their sources and professional advice over six weekly posts.

The ORC has teamed up with Better Homes and Garden HERE to bring you this highly anticipated event.

My Participation in the One Room Challenge

This round will complete my sixth season of the “One Room Challenge”. So many other talented people are also participating as guests, please check out their spaces HERE.

I also invite you to check out my prior guest challenges and spaces I have remodeled over the last few years.

• Dining Room Renovation
• Home Wine Cellar
• Basement Bar Remodel
• Modern French Country Kitchen Renovation
• Master Bathroom Renovation

Prior Weeks Progress of our Home Exterior Modernization

This season, I am modernizing the exterior of our home. You can catch up on the details from the previous weeks below.

• ORC (Week 1) The Before Pictures
• ORC (Week 2) Prepping the Brick for Primer
• ORC (Week 3) Priming the Brick
• ORC (Week 4) Painting Our Brick Home
• ORC (Week 5) Painting Iron Railings, the Front & Garage Doors

Why Paint Our Brick House?

Some of you may be wondering why would we ever want to paint our brick? Isn’t that going to be a lot of maintenance? Not to mention the huge expense of the project. I have wanted to paint our exterior brick from the moment we moved into our house. This is our third brick home and a perfect candidate for painting. Our first home had a red brick exterior. We built that house and really liked the red color of the brick we chose in the early 2000’s and never thought about painting it.

We were not the original owners of Our Second Home, and didn’t care for the orange color of the brick. We briefly thought about paining it, but then moved out before giving the idea any serious consideration.

We love so many things about our current and third brick home, but the yellow and brown color of the brick is not one of them.

Our White Painted Brick Home – The Big Reveal

Having always loved white painted brick homes was another reason to paint the exterior. See where I’m going with this 😉 We have always loved how beautiful our home looks from the street, as it sits high on a hill..it is definitely poised for greatness, but just hadn’t reached it’s full potential…until NOW!

We absolutely love our white house on a hill!

The house has been completely transformed! From top to bottom, every inch of it looks totally different.

Even though we decided to keep the door black, we painted the white frame around the doors and windows black as well.

Having the frame and doors the same color makes the entrance look cohesive and less choppy and gives the appearance of a larger framed door. The color we chose for the door is Sherwin Williams Tricorn Black. The lantern lights were also painted with Tricorn Black.

To add some color and interest to the portico, we added an outdoor mat and two – six foot spiral topiaries from Frontgate. They have small white lights that will look beautiful in the Winter time. The topiaries are quite expensive but you can get the look for less HERE.

The corinthian columns on our portico and front of home are extremely ornate and not really my style. I have never been a big fan of them but I have to say…now that everything is painted, they are kind of growing on me 🙂

The second entrance to the home also got a bit of a makeover.

Two additional spiral topiaries flank the entrance door along with a monogrammed mat, similar HERE. I also added two black benches to frame the space. You can get the look for less HERE.

I love seeing the shadows from the trees reflect onto the white stone in the early afternoon.

One of my favorite parts of our exterior painting are the garage doors!

The black doors are gorgeous!

Also painted in SW Tricorn Black, they look amazing and add so much character to the side of the home. Deciding to paint them black was a last minute decision and we couldn’t be more pleased!

Having a white home makes everything else appear more colorful! White is a highly reflective color and just so pretty on brick.

But choosing the right shade of white was agonizing. I tested several different colors, did a ton of research and talked to experts. Ultimately, I decided to go with…..drum roll please…Alabaster from Sherwin Williams! Alabaster is the color on the far right side of the wall and very pretty on brick. It has a hint of warmth and is not stark white. Why do I love painted white brick? I love how paint neutralizes the color of the mortar and give a beautiful seamless appearance.

If you are trying to decide on exterior white paints, check out The Best Exterior White Colors for Painted Brick Homes.

Moving to the back of the house..yea I know that’s a lot of brick. I love our backyard, it’s a walk out from the basement but also from the kitchen. It’s a two level backyard allowing plenty of space for whatever!

But with the bonus of having two levels…comes a ginormous retaining wall…in….you guessed it MORE BRICK! But it looks soo much prettier painted white and the black railings add a nice touch.

The lower level entrance to the basement. The lanterns add an elegant touch to the space,  even the small stepping patio is all brick.

The day I took these phots, the sky was so lovely. The morning started out partly cloudy then turned mostly sunny.

So very happy with the back of the house now…it has come a long way since…..get ready for it….

Oh my.

We are thrilled with the results of our modernization. The process of painting brick has transformed a dated looking home into one we are proud to call “Our Home”.

The reaction from our neighbors and friends has been overwhelmingly positive!

 I am so excited to decorate the exterior of our home for Christmas!!! And when it snows! Expect to be bombarded with pictures!!

Now I want to show you a favorite view of mine.

Our home is LIT! We added outdoor lighting to the front of the home! OMG! Can I tell you how much we love the look!!! I mean WOW! When we come home at night and drive up our driveway, we ADORE the look of our home! Outdoor lighting makes all the difference to the exterior appearance of a home at night. We were so lucky and thankful to work with Chris Myer from Beautiful Nights. If you live in or around the Washington DC area, I highly recommend giving Chris a call for outdoor lighting. He truly has an eye to make your home look stunning in the evening. I have so many more pictures to share of the lighting at night, this really deserves a separate post. SO stay tuned!

A picture of Mother Nature lighting up the sky in the early dawn.

I am so happy to have you all follow along on these challenges with me, I appreciate your support and encouragement throughout the process. I hope to have inspired some of you to take a leap and transform a space or paint your brick if you are unhappy with it’s appearance. BUT…I only recommend painting exterior brick if the brick is in very good condition. DO NOT paint brick to cover up any problems…painting over issues will only lead to more issues!

I feel so blessed to realize my dream of having a white painted brick home 🙂 I hope you enjoyed following along. Drop me a line and let me know what you think! I also have many more BIG outdoor projects to share with you coming up soon! And they are going to be EPIC!

If you are considering painting your home and are interested in cost, I will disclose what we paid in a future post, which will be available only to my subscribers. Anyone want to guess how many gallons of paint were used to prime and paint this beast?! All the details available to my subscribers – coming soon!!

Denise

XO

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