Earlier this month we found that replacing a garage door can yield an average 71% return on investment at resale, making it one of the top five exterior home improvements for adding value and curb appeal.
If repairing your garage door is no longer practical and you’ve decided to replace an aging or unattractive door, there are many modern models that combine style, durability and energy efficiency to instantly transform a home’s exterior.
We partnered with Clopay for this overview. As North America’s largest manufacturer of residential and commercial garage doors, Clopay offers a broad selection of designs and materials that are widely available across the country.
Clopay’s door collections suit a wide range of architectural styles. Below are highlights from several collections — each demonstrates how an upgraded door can dramatically improve a home’s exterior appearance.
Coachman Collection
Carriage-house style doors remain popular because they suit many different home types, not just historic or Victorian houses. The Coachman Collection captures that classic look with modern construction.
The Coachman delivers a wood-like appearance while being built from layered steel and insulation with a woodgrain composite overlay. This construction achieves the carriage-house aesthetic with far less maintenance than natural wood. Decorative hardware and window options let you customize the final look.
Clopay is introducing a 2″ polyurethane-insulated version that provides excellent energy efficiency, improved dent resistance and greater strength. With an R-value of 18.4, this model helps regulate temperature in rooms adjacent to or above an attached garage.
Premium Series
The Premium Series features classic raised-panel steel doors. Steel is a durable, low-maintenance material available in the widest range of insulation levels, colors and price points. Adding decorative windows is a simple way to elevate its appearance.
Avante Series
The Avante Series blends aluminum and glass in a sleek, contemporary design ideal for modern or transitional homes.
Homeowners are increasingly adopting clean, commercial-inspired aesthetics. The Avante’s aluminum frame resists rust and stands up well to year-round outdoor exposure, making it a practical choice for many climates.
Multiple glass options control light and privacy, including clear, mirrored and frosted tempered glass. Frames are powder-coated in a variety of colors to match or contrast your home’s palette.
The Avante works equally well on contemporary architecture and on more traditional row houses, providing a refined, updated look.
Canyon Ridge Collection
Advances in materials allow for highly realistic wood-look doors that eliminate the maintenance concerns of actual wood. The Canyon Ridge Collection is an example of this approach.
Canyon Ridge doors use a low-maintenance composite cladding that replicates the texture and grain of real wood while combining with an insulated steel door for strength and energy efficiency. The faux wood overlay is molded from real wood species to reproduce authentic grain patterns without the drawbacks of natural wood—no rotting, warping, shrinking or cracking.
These doors are durable, energy efficient and easy to maintain, and once installed they closely resemble real wood.
Clopay also offers Ultra-Grain, a multi-layer paint finish that recreates a stained wood appearance on steel doors. Ultra-Grain is available on the Gallery Collection’s polyurethane-insulated vintage-style steel doors and is being added to the three-layer Premium Series raised-panel doors.
This finish can also be applied to Clopay fiberglass entry doors for a cohesive, coordinated look between garage and entryway.
Wood Garage Doors
Solid wood doors offer the greatest character and customization, with many species, profiles and stain options to create a unique, handcrafted appearance. However, wood requires more ongoing maintenance and its longevity can be affected by local climate and exposure.
There are numerous design and material choices to suit any home style, from classic raised-panel steel to realistic wood-look composites and sleek aluminum-and-glass designs. Each option balances aesthetics, maintenance needs, insulation performance and budget differently, so consider which factors matter most for your home.
If you’d like more information about these door styles, contact your local Clopay dealer for details and availability.
In our next article we’ll walk through the process of shopping for a new garage door and highlight interactive visualization tools that help you preview how different doors will look on your home.