Willow and Hearth

The reel opens at a red brick house with a teal front door, a woman in a gray hoodie working on the door, and one line of on-screen text: “Me: it’s just a boring 90’s house.” The caption from @lizpacini reads “Thankful for this boring 90’s home,” followed by the tags #diyhome, #homeexterior, #limewash, #frontporch and #halloweendecor.

What follows is a time compressed record of the whole front of the house changing, about two minutes and 56 seconds long and posted at the end of August 2026. Apart from the opening line and a couple of later captions, the video carries almost no text.

The door comes first. In a few quick shots the teal door is white, then a roller goes over a door in a deep gray blue, and a small brush cuts in around the glass beside it. Then the brick. A hand scoops a thick, creamy white mixture out of a bucket, and a drill with a mixing paddle churns a second bucket in the grass while a tan dog looks on. A few seconds later a woman is brushing the same white onto the lower part of the front wall, with a hose coiled on the concrete and the dog standing next to her.

The progress is easy to follow from the yard. At about 31 seconds the ground floor of the house is white, with a dark door, while the upper floor is still red brick. At 40 seconds the front is almost entirely pale. She works with a long pole roller up the side wall, and a later night shot shows the front lit from inside while someone works on the concrete slab at the door.

Next the house gets bigger. A stack of lumber sits on the lawn, wooden beams are laid on sawhorses, and a man stands on a ladder under a new roof frame with a nail gun, framing the front. A later frame shows a woman on a red ladder inside the new porch, whose ceiling is now pale wood planks and whose posts are heavy timber.

The floor is the slowest job. A woman kneels beside a low brick wall with a red bucket, then works on the entry steps and porch floor with brick laid in a herringbone pattern. In one frame she is at a small wet saw on a bench with a pink chair behind her. In another she wears work gloves and wipes white grout across the pattern of red brick with a small trowel.

The video then goes back to the beginning. A wide shot shows the original house with red brick, green shutters and a teal door, and over it the text “It’s almost done but…” The last shots show the finished front: a gabled timber porch, a dark front door with a wreath, two lanterns, orange fall trees in pots, pumpkins and red flowers along the steps.

Two viewers weighed in on the brick. One wrote “Never paint the natural bricks.” Another wrote that “it’s YOUR house” and that if someone buys it later, they can renovate it how they want. The caption does not say what product she used beyond the #limewash tag.

Anyone weighing the same change on a brick house can check the trade body’s guidance first. The Brick Industry Association’s technical note on changing the appearance of brick says that paint “can be very difficult to remove from brick masonry without causing damage,” and that painted exterior brickwork “can require repainting on a regular basis,” with acrylic latex paint needing “multiple reapplications over the life of the brickwork.” It describes limewash as a mineral treatment that soaks into the pores and can last five to 10 years or more, and says mineral paints often carry warranties of 15 years or more.

The same Brick Industry Association technical note lists the preparation that matters before anything goes on the wall. Evaluate and repair mortar, flashing, weeps and sealant joints first, fix water problems, let new or repaired masonry cure and dry for at least 30 days, clean it thoroughly, and test a small area. It recommends treatments that leave the wall with high water vapor permeance, warns that they can compromise brickwork if they trap moisture, and advises against heavy applications or too many coats. It says not to use muriatic acid on brick, and not to use sandblasting to remove a past treatment.

For the porch, the video shows the sequence: a man with a nail gun framing the roof, then timber posts, a planked ceiling and a brick floor. The video does not show whether the work was permitted, so ask your city or county building department what a new roofed porch needs before the lumber arrives.