What color is your porch floor?

[Nicholas]

Mine, tongue and groove 3x, has the trace of gray. I remember my grandmother's 1923 rowhouse porch in Philly being gray.

Saw many other homes around here, including the large restored 4 square down the street with the gray.

So, let me guess...gray? Is that the correct standard historic color?

[Mick_VT]

From many old photos I have seen, up here in Vermont they were either likely bare wood or a dark color (probably brown, deep red or green) its hard to tell as they were in black and white. Gray however would look like bare wood in a B&W photo.

I painted mine in a deep hunter green to match my shutters.

[SouthernLady]

I still have the old bluish-gray paint on all of my thresholds in the house, although the doors that get the most use have worn off to the wood. I hope to get a chip off soon to repaint the thresholds the same gray color. I suspect that the original wood flooring on the original L-shaped porch was painted gray as well.

[JRC]

I can't say what color porch floors typically were, originally. But I could probably count on one hand the number of non-gray porch floors I have seen in person. (and the non-gray floors were usually painted more recently)

[Casey]

I found this color at the bottom of all the layers on my back porch, I presume it goes pretty far back to the 1906 construction date.

It's sort of a oak color. Benjamin Moore "Camel".
Casey

[TuckerTavern]

Ours were grey. I do know that dark colors look dirtier quicker than medium colors.

Here is a publication from the NPS on historic porches: http://www.nps.gov/tps/how-to-preserve/briefs/45-wooden-porches.htm

[Vala]

Blue-grey here too for the original color. Seems to be pretty common.

[lovesickest]

My front porch floor has been many colors. When we bought the house it was grey - but the home owners were frugal shoppers - and the granite foundation was also painted a strange aqua (with an olive green house = ???).

From experience, this is what I have observed:

- black floor - looks sharp and stylish but shows muddy/dusty footprints too well
- burgundy floor. Burgundy paint is the devil to paint with. It looked okay, I never loved it and painted over it the next year
- odd light greyish green - showed dark muddy footprints, esp. from those jerk raccoons too well, though looks nice at a distance
- grey - less psychologically exciting than the other colors but definitely serviceable with regards to showing mud, dust, etc.

[TexasRed]

Gray here too

The new house has a huge wrap around porch that is currently painted the same salmon-red as the house. I found this to be odd and not particularly attractive. (Salmon overload!! Kinda like mauve in the 80's)

The forthcoming paint job will return the porch to grey. Still undecided on the house and trim.

Thanks to Tucker Tavern for the link to a very informative article about porches, their care and preservation.

[Nicholas]

Thanks to all and future contributors.

I am going to go with the gray with a tinge of bluish. I have 1/2 gallon left of that brick color I used on the shutters, and was considering finishing it for the porch. I think the gray would break up that coloring and add detail.