Front Door's Crowning Touch - Page 2

Once Jarrett installed that first one, for his own door, his handiwork immediately began to attract the attention of his neighbors.

"They're walking the dog, or whatever, and they say, 'What the heck? I love it! I want it right now!"

Therein lies the rub, however. Jarrett works fulltime at his day job and creates the door kits on nights and weekends as time allows—one at a time, from scratch.

"I just kind of make them to order, when I can," he confessed of his 'well-kept-secret' enterprise.

"Everything comes completely apart. I rebuild the door kit," he said of his manufacturing process. "Its actually a little sturdier than it needs to be."

"When they get a hold of it [the kit], and they turn it around and see how it's made, they go 'whoa!'" he said with a smile, admitting his greatest pleasure comes from seeing "the look on people's faces when they get it and it's installed correctly."

"It's really easy to install," he promised. "It does help to have a second person…and I'm always open to, 'Hey, email me if you have questions.'"

Email is essential to Jarrett's operation, since he does not distribute a phone number or any other contact information—and likes it that way.

"Maybe someday we'll do a website, but I'll kind of have to have a disclaimer," said Jarrett, who's "always been kind of afraid" of publicity leading to more business than he can handle. If someone else started offering the kits, he admitted, "I'd almost be delighted."

Since Jarrett began making his escutcheon kits in 2006, he has filled nearly 400 requests, almost all individual orders, though one customer did order ten.

"That's pretty good. That's a lot of happy homeowners," he said proudly, noting that a customer in San Jose ordered one for an Eichler home that she was rebuilding after it had burned to the ground. "I was actually pretty proud to have my name on [that one]."

Jarrett's kits have a satin chrome finish and include the front/rear door assembly (available in four different doorknob shapes: globe, cone, orbit, and bell), a six-inch escutcheon plate (three variations), a latch bolt, strike plate, fasteners, keys, and instructions. His current price is $200, including shipping.

"It is very hard to find anything that looks like the original hardware, but Jarrett's hardware is perfect," said Renee Adelmann, broker for Marin Modern Real Estate and one of Jarrett's regular customers. "I have used his door kits on my own homes, my listings, and as closing gifts to clients."

Jarrett conceded that having no business website—or phone, for that matter—in this connected day and age may appear, to some, as cause for skepticism. "It's almost like a scam."

But no scam here, Jarrett said reassuringly—just a craftsman keeping alive one small but key feature of the Eichler home—and perhaps its crowning touch.

• To contact Jon Jarrett or to order a kit, email him at [email protected].

(Unfortunately, as of 2019, Jon Jarrett is no longer producing door kits.)