Door frame lower than window frames What would you do (xposted)
Cross posted in Home Decorating:
We've added a new sun room to our house - It's a year around room, mostly windows, that will be used for music (piano playing), reading and my DD will have her PC and drawing supplies there. As they were trimming the windows and door, they asked me what I wanted to do with the door frame, as it's lower than the window frames. This pic shows the problem with a mocked up frame on the door:
They proposed a few options:
1. Not worry about it
2. Raise the door frame up even with window frames and make some sort of simple, decorative molding to go on a board between the frame and top of door
They don't have room to make the molding larger around the entire door because of the light switch between the door and window.
Since the architects were there, I asked why this even occurred, since obviously this couldn't have been the first time they they ran into doors and windows in the same room. They were very general with their answers. First they said something about sometimes you have to match other windows in the room - But this wasn't the case here, as it was a completely new room. Then they said sometimes you have to match other windows on the house - Again, not the case here, as this room was intentionally made to look like it was an addition to the house, not part of the original. Then they said sometimes when you line windows and doors up on the outside, they don't line up on the inside. OK, that made sense....Till a week later when I was looking at the outside and noticed that the door is about an inch lower on the outside too...
I did a little more checking...We put in a new back foyer, and thus a new door and window there. They line up on the inside:
So I looked at the construction drawings. They say "Align WDW WDW Heads w/ Door HD.
Which is pretty much the same thing it says on the construction drawings for back door and window:
So, I'm a little irritated that no one has caught this before (we have bi-weekly meetings with GC and architects). I emailed the GC and asked him how much it would cost to purchase a larger door that will be tall enough to make the trims line up. It's custom order, (2-3 weeks) and a little over $2,000, but they'll do the labor for free.
I didn't point out to GC or Architects what the construction drawing says and I guess I'm a little suspicious by nature, so I don't know if the architects were 'covering' for the GC and the GC is 'covering' for his subs, or if what the plans say mean something else?
Because the trims are so close together, I'm afraid it might be a glaring 'error' if you want to call it that, since the woodwork will be painted white and will probably stand out from the wall color.
I'm sure it's cheaper now to fix (painter is painting outside now), but is it worth $2,000 to me? I know, only I can answer that, but I don't know if I'm just obsessing over something that will fade away once finished and painted or if it will always bother me. Given that the room is mostly windows on 3 sides and all the windows line up and you just have this lower door, does that make it stand out more?
And I don't know if I should question whether I should even have to pay for the fix. In this picture, it appears the header was aligned correctly
And here the door starts getting lowered:
They're really wearing me down, here.
One new suggestion on the decorating forum suggested insisting that the GC lower all of the windows to match door height - but there's 11 windows:
And the architects didn't do interior elevations, so it's a little hard to prove that's what was intended.
So, if it were your house, what would you do?
Comments (14)
renovator8
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renovator8