DIY She Shed Door Build

Our She Shed is almost complete! Wooweee, it’s been a long run. But we’re almost there. This post will show you how to make your own DIY She Shed door using the same material as the exterior walls. I will show you how I also added a lock on the French-style shed doors.

If you want to start from the beginning of the shed build, check out the planning post. Then the foundation build, DIY brick floor, wall framing, siding, roof framing, roofing, exterior trim, and the wall mounted garden closet.

Keep the cost of your shed doors down by making your own. You might even be able to use leftover materials as we will be using the same material we used on the shed walls. Ok here we go.

Measure Your Door Opening:

First things first, measure the overall door opening width and height. I’m assuming your opening is reasonably plumb and square so that the width at the bottom of the opening is basically the same as the width at the top. If that’s not the case, use the smaller width dimension. Same type of thing goes for the height.

We want about about 1/4 inch gap between the frame and the door at all sides. So that means we’ll make the width of the door to be 1/2″ smaller than the frame width (two sides of 1/4 inch gap = 1/2 inch). Do the same for the height. Write down your overall door opening dimensions. We’ll need these for the DIY Shed door build.

She Shed Door Options:

Like I said, we are building the shed door out of the same materials we used on the exterior walls. Hopefully you have some extra material laying around and are able to use scraps to save some money. The shed door is made of a 2×4 “frame” that creates the general shape of the door. This is then covered by a T1-11 exterior plywood panel cut to the exact dimensions of the door. Remember that you can buy the T1-11 panels with finish grooves or as a smooth panel. I am using smooth panels for this shed.

The dimensions of your 2×4 door frame should be as follows:

A. If you are building a single door, your frame should be built to the overall door opening dimensions will be as we measured above.

OR

B. SPECIAL OPTION FOR FRENCH-STYLE DOUBLE DOORS: If you want them to overlap for added weather and critter protection, you want to adjust your 2×4 frame widths slightly. Here are photos of the overlap where the French doors meet.

To achieve this, one frame width is the overall door opening width divided in half PLUS 1 inch. The other side frame width is overall door opening width divided in half MINUS 1 inch. Remember, these are the widths for your door frames. The dimension of the T1-11 panel for each door is the overall door opening width divided in half to keep the French door looking equal.

She Shed Door 2×4 Frame Build:

Now that we’ve got our dimensions figured out, let’s build the 2×4 door frames.

Here is the 2×4 frame for one side of the French doors I am making. You can see it is a simple rectangle with the 2×4’s oriented so they will lay flat, or with their wide dimension against the T1-11 panel.

Use two pocket screws to connect the horizontal 2×4’s to each vertical 2×4. Here is a close up of the pocket screws.

You can buy a special pocket hold jig to help you install pocket screws. Or you can simply do it by hand by starting your drill bit perpendicular to the 2×4. Once it’s started, rotate it to the pocket screw angle and drill that hole. I have trouble with the jig and just end up doing these “by hand.”

She Shed Door Panel:

If you remember from the siding post, I like to prime the T1-11 siding before installing it to add an extra layer of weather protection. Here are my panels cut to size and primed.

Next, nail or screw the panel to the frame. Make sure your connectors are under 2″ in length or they will come out the other side. I used 1-5/8″ length exterior screws at about 6 inches on center around the perimeter of the door.

Here is the door with the T1-11 panel installed. You can see the frame sticking out slightly on the left side of the panel. That is where my French-style doors will overlap.

She Shed Door Trim:

You can add trim to your doors in whatever style you like. Here is one door with 1×4 flat primed trim. I opted for 1×4 trim to match the trim around the door frame and kept it simple. Add trim diagonals if you like as well.

She Shed Door Paint:

Before painting, caulk all the trim joints and edges with a good-quality exterior, paintable caulk to give the door a finished look.

Then, paint your doors to match your shed! I used two coats of Kilz Interior/Exterior Primer and at least one coat of good-quality BEHR exterior-grade paint from Home Depot. Using a paint sprayer really makes the job quick. I’d recommend getting this sprayer if you doing enough painting that you wish it would go faster. It’s a real time-saver and easy to use. I bought one a few years ago now and you can see I have gotten a lot of use out of it

Here are my two sets of doors fully painted. The tall set are the front doors, the back set are for the wall mounted garden closet.

She Shed Door Hinges & Locks:

The She Shed Doors work best with exterior mounted hinges, meaning you see them mounted to the exterior of the door and the sides of the door frame. You can get very decorative hinges or keep it simple. I opted for three simple black hinges on each door. I first screwed the hinges to the doors and then installed the doors to the shed. Use shims and an extra set of hands to get the door installed plumb and square.

Then, I installed a simple door pull on each door.

Finally, for the lock, I used simple shed door locks I found on Amazon.com, one for each door set. They come with keys and have worked great so far.

Here are the finished DIY She Shed doors! First, the doors on the back wall mounted garden closet. I only needed two hinges each door here.

Here are the finished front doors! Looking good yeah?

Finished DIY She Shed:

For a finishing touch, I added a farmhouse-style gooseneck light above the entry doors. This is actually a solar light that turns on at night. See the small solar panel on the left corner? It’s just free of the door swing and works great. You can buy it on Amazon.com. I like that the head is adjustable so you focus the light inward or outward.

I’ll be honest, I don’t have a final cute photo of the inside because this “She” is using her She Shed to store all her tools, granted, very cutely. I had a lot of storage shelving on hand so I moved those in immediately and happily organized my tools. Someday I’ll build a larger garage and upgrade this She Shed into a much cooler space. For now, here are some finished photos before I filled it with all my tools.

Doors open. The floors were still drying out but they eventually dried to a very cute gray.

The gable light and interior lofted framing.

Moved in all the storage shelves. I store soooo much stuff in here!

Last, but not least, the wall mounted garden closet stores a ton of yard tools. Here I am filling it up. I got some garage hangers to help hang tools and install get even more.

Now the shed build is DONE! Wow! Let me know if this series of posts was helpful in the comments below. I’d love to see your own DIY She Shed build.