Our front porch was carpeted when we moved in. I thought that was pretty tacky. The previous owners had pretty good taste however so I figured it must have been carpeted for a reason, like to hide a huge hole or something. Well after 6 years the carpet was shot. It had ripped right where first step onto the porch and the cats were not helping either. Nikki and I decided to re-carpet the porch with a neutral beige outdoor carpet.

We pulled up the carpet and to our surprise, there was not any serious damage to be repaired beyond what we had already seen. Instead of laying down more carpet we instead decided to paint the front porch.

One thing lead to another as they always do in home improvement projects. By the time we were done, we had:

• primed and painted our blue ceiling
• removed the old carpet and staples
• sanded entire porch
• patched porch with bondo
• re-caulking on floor along house
• removed metal flashing all the way around porch and refinished wood underneath
• primed and painted the porch
• repeated all the above steps on the back porch too

Not only that, we were not happy with the first floor color we used so we painted it again. The second coat was dark and it took two coats to look even. I hope we never have to paint that porch again.

Preview Image Size Thumbnail Small Medium Large

Smll Med Lrg old carpet, worn out to say the least	Smll Med Lrg all furniture and welcome mat removed	Smll Med Lrg blue ceiling getting primed	Smll Med Lrg used an entire gallon sized container of bondo on porch
Smll Med Lrg all carpet removed, ready to start sanding and patching	Smll Med Lrg floor was pretty rough where all the foot traffic goes	Smll Med Lrg	Smll Med Lrg final coat on ceiling, dove white
Smll Med Lrg	Smll Med Lrg very liberal amounts of bondo to keep the floor together in the front	Smll Med Lrg primer going down, new caulk applied	Smll Med Lrg
Smll Med Lrg	Smll Med Lrg light brown top coat, didnt like the look of it from a distance	Smll Med Lrg	Smll Med Lrg
Smll Med Lrg	Smll Med Lrg	Smll Med Lrg	Smll Med Lrg