We have been working so hard outside these past several months on the garden pergola, the garden itself, the chicken coop, etc.  While I absolutely love working outside, I have been itching to get inside and do some fun things.  Well, I finally crossed something off of one of my lists inside our home yesterday that has been on the list since last year.  And, it makes me so happy.  I wanted to share today what we use on our antique glass doors for privacy.

What We use on Our Antique Doors for Privacy

As you probably know, we have several antique doors here in our home.  We have the ones in the upstairs bathroom, the set of pantry doors in the kitchen, the coat closet in the laundry room, and the coat closet in the entry way.  Well, none of them were actually done when they were installed last year. Some were missing glass panes and the bathroom glass was clear.. so hello, no privacy.

There are so many options when looking to transform old doors.  You can switch out the glass to mirrors, but that would require a lot of money and a lot of work.  There is the film that you can buy on Amazon, but my experience with that isn’t good.  If you don’t get the cuts PERFECT, it looks awful. If it’s too small, you can see the gap and if it’s too big, bubbles form under it.  I have replaced glass with old textured glass for privacy before which I absolutely love.  But that can get very pricey if you don’t have the glass on hand which we did before.  Also, you can do the antique mirror method which I did on a door in the old house. 

Check out that project here.

And, then there is my old tried and true Frosted Glass spray paint by Rust’Oleum.  

This is a product that I have used for YEARS.  The first time that we used it was on a set of pantry doors.  We had a pantry in our kitchen that was the size of a clothes closet that would typically be in a bedroom.  When we bought the house, that pantry had 2- 5 panel doors.  Someone had given us a set of antique french doors years before.  They found them in their attic and had no use for them.  Those doors happened to be the perfect size for that pantry.  So we ended up hanging those french doors on our pantry but I wanted privacy so that we couldn’t see the contents inside.  The Frosted Glass spray paint worked so well on those antique french doors that I also used it on a closet in that old house.

Tips when using the Frosted Glass spray paint.

Since we have used this so many times, I thought I would share how I actually do this.  And, I will also share a few tips that I have learned along the way.

• Make sure to scrape off any old paint or finish on your glass panes because you will see that once it’s done.  And then use glass cleaner to get them nice and clean
• I don’t tape off my wood around the windows.  I have before and it takes so long and I don’t feel like it’s worth the time.  The doors that I use this on are antiques and aren’t in perfect condition anyway.  And I don’t see anything on the wood except maybe a duller finish, which doesn’t bother me. See the pic below of the inside of the door after I was finished.
• On the inside of the door, start spraying light coats of this spray paint. Obviously the more coats you apply, the more private it will make the glass.  I have found that 9-10 light coats is the best.  And, for reference, I didn’t even use a half can of spray paint for this door.

And that’s it!

You can remove this product.  I have found that glass cleaner and a razor blade work well to remove it.  In fact, I usually avoid cleaning the back of the doors except to dust them with a feather duster because I don’t want to disturb it.  When I shared this over on social media, I had someone say that they have used this on the inside of their garage doors and it works well in the fluctuating temps.  

This Frosted Glass spray paint is so simple to use and costs a few dollars to transform a glass door into a privacy door.  Have you ever used this?  If so, let me know what you have used it on.  Also, let me know if you have any questions, as I will try to answer them and add them to this post.