Update Your Home with a Modern Garage Door

by Rachel Lyon, Editorial Director for The House Designers

Whether you’re building new or renovating, it’s a great idea to install a modern garage door if you’d like your home to have updated, transitional curb appeal. The garage is the largest single feature visible on the exterior, so putting your design focus there will give you the most impact with minimal effort. Here are some modern garage door looks to consider to update your façade!

A Focus on Glass

The first thing most people think of when they imagine modern or contemporary architecture is glass. Improvements in glass manufacturing that made it possible to produce larger, clearer panes in the mid-20^th century are why we have these homes today! When no longer bound by practical restrictions, many architects took a large step away from traditional designs to develop modern construction, but that doesn’t mean that more traditional homes can’t get an update, too.

Nowadays, appreciation for transitional architecture is booming. This diverse category takes traditional home styles—like country, Craftsman, Mediterranean, etc.—and simplifies and streamlines them for a chic contemporary feel. Removing or toning down historical decorative embellishments and increasing the amount of glass on a home can really make a difference—just compare an old-fashioned farmhouse to one of today’s modern farmhouses. And you don’t even have to modify your window openings when you incorporate more glass into your façade with doors. Grid-style modern garage doors with glass panels add plenty of bright appeal and sharp clean lines that will update any exterior, and they’ll fit right into the garage you already have—it’s no wonder they’re so popular for renovations!

Interest with Asymmetry

Another feature common in modern and contemporary design is asymmetry. From unique rooflines with angled planes going in multiple directions to exteriors defined by sections of different siding materials, these homes tend to avoid regularity in favor of standing out. The charm of most transitional homes is that they still have traditional base designs, so if you want to add a modern twist, look to your finishes rather than planning a big structural overhaul.

Again, doors give you plenty of ways to add asymmetrical appeal between lites and glass designs, but given their breadth, garage doors offer the most bang for your buck. Explore the options beyond grids and glass panels and you’ll find a variety of garage door window layouts. For example, windows stacked on one side of the door can be long, short, or slim to tailor the final look on the house. Even though they’re similar in theory, you’ll see just how different they are when you see installed examples. Other layouts cluster windows in the corner(s) or intersperse them throughout the planks. The possibilities are endless when you consider custom doors, which are a great way to hit just the right transitional note if you aren’t drawn to the stock options.

Neat Horizontal Lines

If you look at the construction of a traditional carriage house garage door, you’ll notice that the planks on its base are oriented vertically. And if you want to add grooves to such a door, they’ll also run up and down. With that established in the past, designers opted for horizontal planks and grooves to ensure that modern and contemporary homes had their own defined style. Today’s overhead operation means garage doors are constructed with horizontal panels anyway—so they can roll up and down to avoid clearance issues—so form meets function in this case.

As you can imagine, there are tons of garage door construction options that allow you to get the density of horizontal lines you want. Flush panel garage doors minimize horizontal lines to only those between the door sections while grooved panel options add additional lines across each panel for consistency from top to bottom. If you prefer a plank look, the planks themselves will define the lines, or you can really draw attention to the spaces between them with metal accent stripping. Consider the level of complexity elsewhere on your façade to find a balanced and complementary garage door.

Whatever sort of garage door you’re in the market for, Clopay® has you covered with an extensive catalog that spans all architectural inspirations! They offer stylish options in steel, aluminum, faux wood, and real wood to cater to all needs, and their handy Door Imagination System™ allows you to virtually test your choices before committing. You don’t have to imagine the boost to your curb appeal when you can see it in preview!