Victorian house owners - Talk to me about door knobs!

[hackneybird]

We are doing up a Victorian house. On the landing we have four doors for which we have to buy door knobs. The walls are being skimmed and painted white, and we're having a grey/beige carpet laid. The doors are traditional four panels and are being painted white.

However, we don't know which door knobs to go for! Should we mix and match? Have all the same?

What's tough is that I want either aged brass or porcelain, and DH wants either chrome or satin chrome. Argh.

What do you have?

Our upstairs doors have the original knobs - these are round brass. We are sourcing similar ones on eBay to put onto the doors downstairs. If I'm going to be brutally honest, I think chrome would look WEIRD in a Victorian context. Unless you're doing it all to look really modern? (No offence to your DH!)

I don't think any sort of chrome is right in a Victorian house unless you're going for a modern look anyway. We have glass 'onion' handles on aged brass back plates with the odd slightly different handle from Anthropologie. But I quite like quirky accessories rather than uber classic.

Thanks for your replies - I agree not feeling the chrome idea in a Victorian house. We're not going for a very modern feel particularly, although the previous owners ripped out all the cornicing etc. and we aren't putting it back in upstairs - only downstairs.

We both like the reeded brass handles, although the nicest ones we can find are £42 inc delivery and as we have to buy four or five it makes it very expensive.

We had to replace most of our door knobs, and found these (well similar) that were an almost exact copy of the originals. They worked well too in a fairly contemporary renovation.

Lovely door knobs

I went for black beehive knobs with silvery attachments. Modernish but in keeping too. Search ebonies black beehive knob and they should pop up. Love crystal ones but they are pricey new or vintage...

Yes I like the ebonised ones but DH not keen, annoyingly. How about porcelain? Or these? Sorry don' t know how to do proper nice looking links.

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/271220239119?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1438.l2648

Have a look for a reclamation yard near you, that's where I get relatively cheap bits from TBH.

I think it depends what look you are after. I renovate victorian terraces for a living and always replace the brass with satin chrome. If the brass were original and heavy and looked good I may leave them but with a contemporary interior I would change. Also like black porcelain in certain schemes. New brass never

Black beehive ones are lovely too