I have always wanted a round hobbit doorway but I didn't want to open up the wall and modify the framing. Then, it occurred to me that I could have the look of a round doorway, without tearing into the wall. This project creates the illusion of a round doorway by attaching Styrofoam panels in a circle around the existing doorway. The sides of the doorway that fall inside the circle are disguised with decorative wooden panels.

I titled this "easy," because you don't need to modify the wall, but depending on the foam you use, it can be time consuming. Much effort could be saved by using flat Styrofoam sheets, and plain wooden panels or some other form of decorative in-fill. I had foot-thick Styrofoam blocks, which I split into three pieces to make the side panels. That took a lot of time, and more time was needed to make the cut Styrofoam flat and smooth. If you are going with a faux brick look, it isn't necessary (or even desirable) to make the foam panels smooth. I also discovered that a mottled painting technique is very effective at hiding textures and uneven surfaces.

This doorway has three parts, an outer ring made from segments of drywall, a foam arch, above, and foam side panels to complete the circle. Carved wooden panels fill in the sides of the circle, and they were much easier to carve than you would imagine. The Styrofoam can be made to look like anything you like, I chose a ring of bricks, surrounded by a ring of "plasters."

You can leave out the drywall and make the whole thing out of Styrofoam. Whatever design you choose, it is important to hide the upper corners and head of the existing doorway. For this five-foot wide doorway, the rings needed to be a foot wide to cover the corners of the doorway (on the outside of the circle), and the head of the doorway (on the inside of the circle).

All the additions were done without modifying the existing wall. If someone wanted to restore the doorway to its original condition, all the parts could be removed, the molding re-attached, and the holes in the wall patched within a matter of hours.

Supplies

Cardboard for templates

Drywall scraps

Jigsaw

Sandpaper

brad nailer (or just use finishing nails to mount the drywall)

For the side panels:

Clear Pine Board

Carving tools

Carbon Paper

Big Graph Paper

Stain and Sealer

For the foam panels:

8 blocks of foam, 2 feet, by 2 feet by one foot, each

Clay Foam, about two pounds

Various foam working tools (see photos)

Vinyl Spackle and spackling tools

Carpenter's square

Two electrical boxes (cut down to extend the light switch boxes)

Hot Glue for mounting the electrical box extensions.

Paints, brushes, etc.

Faux wood grain tool

Whisk broom

4-inch Deck Screws

Finishing nails

Decorative cut geodes (optional)

Step 1: Planning Your Hobbit Doorway

To get started, first remove the trim around the existing doorway so you can draw some circles on the wall. I'm a cardboard hoarder, so I put some large pieces of thick cardboard across the doorway and used a screw for the center of the circle for this doorway. You could also use a piece of wood nailed across the doorway to make a center point.

Draw an outer circle that extends past the upper corners of the doorway, but don't make the circle so large that it crowds the ceiling. For the inside circle, you want to leave enough room between the top of the doorway and the bottom of the foam arch so that the foam covering the head of the doorway will not be too thin. My center point for the circle was 40 inches above the floor, and the radius of the outer circle is 52 5/8-inches. The inner circle has a radius of 40 5/8-inches.

The ring(s) surrounding the doorway add up to a foot wide. I chose to make a ring of bricks around the inside edge of the circle, and added a "keystone" at the top, and stones at the sides (I wish I had omitted these, as some people seem to think it's a "Stargate"). The other side of the doorway does not have a ring of drywall. For that side of the doorway, I thought it would be interesting to imitate wooden beams, but that took more time, as the foam has to be perfectly flat to use wood grain tools. Use your imagination to make a doorway that suits your tastes, but don't make it too hard on yourself.

The thing about doorways is, they have two sides. So when you start planning, just accept the fact that you're really taking on two projects.

Step 2: Make the Outer Ring (optional)

I put a ring of drywall around the front side of this doorway because I thought it would add another layer of depth to the doorway. The drywall ring is three inches wide. For the back side of the doorway, I just made the foam panels a full foot wide and left out the drywall.

The drywall ring was actually pretty easy to build. I stuck a nail in a crack in our driveway, and drew circles for both the inner and outer edge of the ring with a string compass. Keeping the knots in your string compass the same, draw arcs on a scrap of drywall for both the inside and outside of the ring. Move the drywall scrap a bit and repeat the drawing enough times to make all the pieces you need to complete the ring.

Cutting drywall with a jigsaw is a breeze, if a bit messy. Lay the drywall segments around the driveway circle so you can mark where to cut the pieces to make a smooth circle. Once the pieces are cut and smoothed with sandpaper, it's time to mount them on the wall. I didn't want this to be permanent, so the pieces are mounted using a brad nail gun. It would also work to just tack them in place with small finishing nails or drywall screws. A bit of buttering with drywall mud and some paper tape on the joints and you're done. Be careful not to leave any drywall mud on the wall, as that would be difficult to hide, if you want to remove the pieces.

Step 3: Cut Parts for the Foam Ring

There are two basic components to this foam work. The top of the doorway is made up from three, foot-thick blocks, hollowed out and glued together to form an arch that fits snugly around the head of the doorway. Matching foam side panels go on either side of the doorway (front and back), to make the arch into a circle. The front facing panels are about nine inches wide and three inches thick, and the panels for the back side of the doorway are twelve inches wide, and three inches thick. Note: I glued on some flat foam pieces to raise the surface of the keystone and the side stones to add depth.

Using the same pencil and string compass (this time on the foam blocks laid out on the living room floor), I marked the arc shapes where the blocks will be cut. For the side panels, I first cut five arc-shaped blanks from the foot-thick blocks, and then split the foam blanks into three pieces. I needed 15 of these segments to complete the four six-foot tall side panels for the front and back of the doorway.

The foam blocks are light, and it's kind of hard to hold them steady for cutting, so I made a simple jig that fits the two-foot square blocks and holds them steady. This jig is just screwed down to a mobile set of shelves that I'm using for an indoor workbench. The front and back sides of the jig are hinged, and held together at the top with a bungee cord, so the blocks are held securely. This works alright for splitting the blocks into thirds. For making the arc cuts, you need to wedge a piece of a foam scrap into the jig, to fill the gap and hold the foam tightly for sawing.

I tried a number of methods for cutting the thick foam blocks, including a bow-saw I made from a saw blade and a fiberglass driveway marker. I also tried an electric carving knife, fitted with a longer blade. In the end I went back to using my simplest tool, just a three-foot long bow-saw blade with a handle mounted on one end. Resist the urge to apply downward pressure on the saw blade or your cuts will come out crooked. I mark the front and back of each cut, so I could check to see if the blade was straying off the line. Switching ends from time to time also helps keep the cuts on track. Even with all the checking, I still had a lot of variation in the thickness of the parts. If I had it to do over again, I think I would just buy flat foam sheets and cut the parts without having to split blocks. [This project also convinced me that I need to get over my fear of electricity and use a hot wire to cut the foam blocks for my next project.]

I regret that I didn't get a photo of our dog, covered with foam particles from visiting the cutting room.

Step 4: Make Foam Parts Into Panels

Several arc-segments need to be glued together to make each side panel. I'm using bamboo skewers to join the segments together so they will be sturdy enough to survive the shaping process. There is a trick to aligning the segments for joining them with the skewers. First, you poke toothpicks into the blocks (on one side) being careful to get the toothpicks in squarely. Then, reverse the toothpicks (mine are only pointed at one end), placing the blunt end back into the hole, and color the pointy ends with a marker. While the marker ink is still wet, align the blocks on a flat surface and slide them together. Now you have perfectly matching points to insert the skewers. Pre-pierce the foam with the long skewers to make nice straight holes in each side of the foam, then smear glue on one end of each skewer and push them halfway into the holes on one side (I found it worked better to leave the blunt ends of the skewers sticking out). Smear some more glue on the protruding ends of the skewers, and on each of the faces to be joined. Finally, lay the blocks flat and slide the blunt end of the skewers into the empty holes, bringing the blocks together tightly. Don't sweat it if the joints don't come together tightly (none of mine did) or if something is slightly out of alignment. Foam is forgiving, and you can easily fill gaps later. The main thing is that the side panels need to be flat, and they need to stay together while you're shaping them.

I have accumulated a large number of tools for shaping foam, but there are only a few that I use for most of the work. The small curved rasp is one of the most useful tools, followed by a flat Stanley Surform tool (like a giant microplane grater), and a hacksaw blade with a rag wrapped around one end for a handle. I also have some tools I made from discarded sander-belts mounted on chunks of foam.

The hollow "slots" in the blocks that form the arch are sandwichd around the head of the doorway. These slots were fairly difficult to carve out. I first cut down vertically on each side of the slot with the bow saw blade, then I went to work removing the material between the saw-cuts. I tried about every tool in my bag for this step, starting with a paddle board that I shot staples through. The paddle board was so messy that I went back to using the utility knife, but that was too slow. I even tried the electric carving knife (the kind with two reciprocating blades) to cut out large chunks, but in the end I went back to using the paddle board, and just accepted that it was going to make a huge mess. Note that I'm doing this indoors. It was too cold to work outside, and the lightest breeze spreads foam chaff to the ends of the earth. At least, indoors, I can contain the mess to one room (okay, I'll admit that, with the dog's help, the mess spread to the entire house).

Before sculpting the details, you need to make the foam panels smooth and flat. In the past, I have used light weight spackle to cover rough foam pieces. This time I thought I'd try using "Foam Clay" that I've seen other makers here use in their projects. I have never used Foam Clay before, and it took me a while to figure out the best way to apply this stuff. As you add water to this stuff, it gets stickier and stickier, eventually becoming like bubble gum or marshmallow cream. I could not get it thin enough to apply with a brush, but with some effort I got it to a consistency that I could apply with drywall tools. It worked out pretty well, but the spackle was much faster and easier to apply. Smoothing the panels with the diluted foam clay was a slow process, as there is a lot of shrinkage and it took multiple coats to fill all the plucking holes. I'm not sure I would choose this foam clay over spackle for future projects. The foam clay takes a lot longer to apply as you need to let it dry between coats, and it doesn't always go on the way you think it will. It does work great for filling gaps, though.

After the segments reach their final shape, I traced the outlines for the bricks, using a little cardboard template. The grout lines were shaped with a small, tube-like microplane tool that started life as a nutmeg grater.

This would have been much, much easier if I had cut the panels from Styrofoam sheets instead of splitting all those blocks, but I had blocks, so that's what I used.

Step 5: Paint the Foam Panels

I gave the panels a couple of coats of gesso, before painting the ring of faux bricks around the inside edge of the circle. There are three alternating colors of bricks. Once the colors are painted on, I used a flat piece of sponge like a stamp, to apply lighter colors to the dark bricks, and darker colors to the light bricks. All my colors are just blended acrylic paints.

The ring of "plaster" around the bricks is painted a shade of yellow, with splotches of a pinkish color dabbed all around with a sponge. The dabbing process is easy, just be sure to change the position of the sponge to avoid a repeating pattern. For the ring of drywall, I painted a base coat of pinkish orange, and added yellow mottling with a sponge. I hadn't intended this, but the plaster ring and the drywall ring use almost the same colors, but with the base coat and the mottling swapped.

For the keystone, I couldn't resist adding a little whimsical flair by embedding some tiny geodes that I bought by the pound into the foam. If folks think it looks too silly, I can always pull them out and fill the holes with foam clay. The rock is alien greenstone, an imaginary rock type with imaginary minerals that I printed with a little stamp cut from a pencil eraser. I just felt like having some fun after spending a lot of time working on the foam parts.

The stones on the sides are meant to imitate granite, but I'm not thrilled with the look, and I may repaint them later.

Step 6: Mount the Foam Panels

The foam arch fits fairly tightly around the top of the doorway, and the side panels for the front of the doorway are held securely between the drywall ring and the decorative wooden panels. Note, light switches on both sides of this doorway made it tricky fitting the arch into place. I ended up having to carve out some of the foam slot, so I could slide the arch past the light switches.

The foam side pieces for the back side of the doorway are held in place with 4-inch deck screws. Once the pieces are all in place, the gaps between the panels were filled with slices of foam and Foam Clay. It took a few applications, with sanding in between, to hide the seams. A final coat of paint for the joined areas and the foam work is complete.

Step 7: Make the Decorative Wood Side Panels

To give the impression of a circular opening, the half-moon gaps between the ring of foam "bricks" and the existing doorway need to be disguised. While I was mulling over what kind of paneling to use, it occurred to me that I could add a nice Hobbit touch by carving a simple design into the wood. I confess that I outright stole the idea for the cattail design from one of the fireplaces in Bag End. It's hard to get a design simpler than cattails. Plain wood panels would suffice, but that's a missed opportunity.

I found a mostly-clear pine board at our local sawmill and cut out the half-moon pieces (11 1/2 inches wide). The same driveway string compass worked for drawing arcs for guide-lines to fill in the cattail design. I drew the arcs on a piece of large graph paper (any paper will do) and shaped the the cattail leaves and heads with matching curves. Once I was satisfied with the drawing, I used carbon paper to transfer the design onto the first panel. For the mirror image on the second panel, you just flip the drawing over, and retrace the design onto the second panel.

I had never done any carving before, but it didn't take long to learn all I needed to know. First, it's not as hard as it looks, it just takes time. You really only need a few tools: a gouge, a skew blade, and a short-bladed knife were the main tools used for this project. Because the drawing had some narrow spots, I also bought a narrow gouge to carve out the tight places.

It is absolutely necessary to have very sharp tools and to sharpen them often during the carving process. I had not expected this carving to take as long as it did, and I found that I could only work on the panels for a few hours each day before I started getting sloppy. I took my time and spent about ten days carving each panel. The actual carving turned out to be much easier than I expected, just go slow and don't try cut too deep or gouge out too much at once. Since these carvings are deep, the entire carving needed to be repeated many times to reach the full depth.

I went around all the outlines with the knife, cutting only as deep as I could without having to push hard on the blade. Once the lines are cut, use the gouge to remove some of the wood on the outside of the lines, recut the outlines, and repeat. After a couple of rounds of deepening the outlines, I worked down the entire background to a consistent depth, and repeated the process (over and over). It took about five rounds of carving down the background to get it deep enough. Go slowly, taking only a little material at a time, and don't force the blade. Be careful to carve in the direction that the grain of the wood dips out of the board. You will quickly notice when you are going the wrong direction. If the wood starts to splinter, either sharpen the blade and take a thinner slice, or flip the board around and cut in the opposite direction. You need to constantly be aware of the wood grain. The other thing you need to constantly be aware of that you are working with very sharp tools; one slip and you'll be breaking out the bandages. Pine stains easily, so try not to bleed on your work.

When I started carving the cattail heads, I realized that to make them round the depth of the background would need to be half the width of the cattail heads. Initially, the cattail heads were about an inch-and-a-half wide, which would mean the background would have to be 3/4ths-inch deep. Since the boards are only 3/4ths of an inch thick, I had to narrow the cattail heads a little to avoid breaking through the board. You can use a flashlight on the back side of the board to see if it is getting too thin.

I kind of cheated on carving the cattail heads. To make them cylindrical, I first sanded them to a smooth round shape, then went back over the sanded finish with the carving tools to give the heads a whittled appearance.

When the background was at the final depth, I went around all the vertical cut surfaces with an emery board to smooth up any gouges and give the raised portions a smooth appearance. Lastly, I gave the leaves a bit of a twist on the bends by slanting the top surface. You have an opportunity to correct any chipped places in the raised areas by carving them out. Try not to chip the raised outer border, as that stays the same height.

Once I was satisfied with the carving, I went over the surface, very lightly, with some fine sandpaper, just enough to remove splinters. After blowing off the dust, each panel gets a coat of sealer and stain.

I wanted to give the panels a honey-colored stain, but when I tried various stains on sample boards, I didn't like the way the stain came out unevenly on the background. Someone suggested that I apply the sealer first, and then apply the stain on top. This seemed to work very well. With the wood sealed, the stain went on much more evenly. You do need to watch out for "puddling" of the stain in the low spots.

Note, there is a cut-out in the right panel for the light switches. I'm not sure whether this is up to code, but I bought a plastic electrical box, and cut it down to the thickness of the board. This "extension" to the original switch box gives you screw holes for mounting the light switches. I used hot glue to mount the extension to the original switch box. Each panel is mounted to the wall with a finishing nail at the top and bottom.

Step 8: Don't Forget the Back Side

For the back side of the doorway, I made a faux wood beams for the inner part, and just painted the foam for the outer ring. Using the faux wood grain tools on the foam panels turned out to be tricky. The tools work best on a hard, flat, smooth surface. The foam failed on all points. With the wood graining tools, you first paint a light coat, then after it's dry you paint a dark coat, and drag the tools through the paint while it's still wet. any slight variations in surface flatness or smoothness shows. Also, the paint tends to dry fairly quickly, so you cant just go back and redo your work too many times. I recommend watching some of the many online videos about using the wood graining tools.

The first try on the foam that I'd finished with Foam Clay was a flop. The surface was too uneven. I ended up going back to using vinyl spackle to try to flatten and smooth the surface. Even after two rounds of spackling and sanding, the surface was still kind of wobbly, with high spots and low spots. I also found out that you really need to seal the acrylic paint undercoat first. The matte finish makes the top coat really bite into the undercoat, ruining the wood grain effect . Even with two coats of clear sealer (satin finish is what I had on hand), it was difficult to get the wood grain to look realistic. Applying a final top coat of thinned brown paint and brushing with a whisk broom helped hide some blemishes, but the finish isn't quite what I'd hoped for. Overall, I think I would skip the wood look and stick with brick or stone.

For the wood panels on the backside, I wanted a much simpler (to carve) drawing. Since I'm working with pine, I made a rough sketch of a pine tree. It's hard to depict the needles, and I have to admit that my first attempt (with lots of pointy ends) failed badly. Instead, I redrew the design, using blobs to suggest the clumps of pine needles. For fun, I added a few pine cones, made with the 1/8th inch gouge I got for carving the narrow spots. For this carving, I just took the background down one step. The only tricky part was carving the little gaps between the clumps of pine needles.

For some details it is better to wait until the finish has been applied before carving. On this carving, I sealed the flat spots for the pinecones first, then used the fine gouge, pushed in vertically, to make the scales. Then applied the same stain I used for the tree bark. Sealing the pinecones before cutting the scales makes the pinecone scales stand out better.

For the tree part, I applied a couple of coats of stain (Golden Oak) to the wood to get it dark enough. The stain ran onto the background in a number of places, but that's easy to fix by re-carving the features with the gouge. Finally, the whole carved panel gets a good coat of sealer.

I came up short on lumber for the backside panels, and I had to wait for the sawmill to cut some more boards before I could make the last panel.

The completed project gives the whole room a whimsical feel, and it lets people know that I'm a Hobbit, at heart. The thing that surprised me the most about this doorway is how huge it seems. Even though the doorway is actually smaller, it looks a lot bigger. The overall doorway is nearly nine feet wide, and it dominates the room. Fortunately, I love this stuff!

You have to be a little careful with the foam, but the wooden side panels take most of the abuse. Foam is easy to damage, but it's also easy to repair. I already had to repair a large area pecked by our chickens (don't ask).

For people who think this project doesn't go with the wall paper on the backside, I don't disagree, but it doesn't really bother me enough to do anything about it. I did not want to take on the project of removing all the wallpaper, and one of my criteria was that the original appearance could be restored with minimal effort, so the wallpaper waits.