Designing the Best: The Front Door

The task of designing, building, and decorating a home or business can seem daunting at first, but at the Front Door in Baton Rouge, it’s just another day. This popular design studio offers the whole package, taking clients from the inception of their idea down to the minute details without losing focus or breaking from the overall design aesthetic. “Our clients are busy people, and our job is to make everything easier. We keep them from having to go through the process over and over with different subcontractors,” says architect Dwayne Carruth, owner of the Front Door. “We take the client from the idea to the finished package, literally from the dirt to the color of the sheets.”

  “It’s all about the ability to tie things together. We think in terms of the big picture. We make sure the color of the brick goes with the paint color in the bathroom and the light fixtures in the kitchen match the plumbing. All these things tie together to make a statement.”

  Dwayne Carruth lives and breathes his craft. “I always knew I was going to be an architect, no question. It comes naturally to me; it is what I was made to do,” he says. He grew up in Greensburg, Louisiana, sketching and playing with Legos as a child. After following his dream and graduating from Mississippi State University in 1992, Carruth moved back to Louisiana to eventually start his own firm. “I love living in Baton Rouge. There is so much going on, especially with the arts, and I can live here and still afford to travel,” he jokes.

  Carruth founded the Front Door in 1995. He began doing custom work for a few houses a year; now his work has become so popular that the design team handles at least 100 home and business projects annually. “We’ve diversified from strictly residential work; in addition to houses for private clients, we also do a lot of builder and developer work. We continue, however, to specialize in high-end custom homes. Last year, we increased our focus on interiors and now offer a full range of services.” Claudia Rumfola, an interior design graduate from LSU, is Carruth’s right-hand woman and designer at the Front Door. “She has a tremendous eye, and our ideas blend seamlessly—almost scary how that works,” says Carruth.

  The Front Door focuses on contemporary design with clean lines, simple forms, and functional interiors; they also do many old-world style homes and eclectic spaces. The store on Perkins Road, in the newly renovated Southdown’s Shopping Center, boasts an extensive hardware showroom. “Six years ago we started doing door and cabinet hardware. We brought in a couple of lines, primarily for our own clients, and it led to a little more and a little more. Now we probably have at least 50 hardware lines, boasting the largest hardware showroom in Louisiana and Mississippi. We are specific about which lines we offer to our clients; we want to give them only the best, including almost a dozen lines that are exclusively available here—no other place in Louisiana. For once, we have New Orleans coming to Baton Rouge for the best selection!”

  Carruth and Rumfola revel in the details, jumping effortlessly from small things like choosing the kitchen cabinet pulls to larger projects, such as designing custom railings for a dramatic grand staircase. “Many of our houses have unique features, so we often involve specialized craftsmen. We’ve got someone right now doing a concrete bathtub, for example. We coordinate custom lighting, ironwork, and artwork. We work one on one with each artist, marrying their style with the client’s vision,” says Carruth.

  The Front Door design team is currently working on a traditional neighborhood development in Central at the Village at Magnolia Square, in addition to a score of houses in several neighborhoods around Baton Rouge, including Audubon Square, Copper Mill, the Country Club of Louisiana, and Casa Colina. “We are also designing the new Ichiban restaurant in Baton Rouge. It is a great new facility for all of their fans, and probably our largest commercial project to date,” says Carruth proudly. Construction on Ichiban should start by the end of 2010. ✦

The Front Door

4273 Perkins Road

Baton Rouge, LA

225.388.9353