What are the Different Kinds of Attic Doors?

Many houses come with an attic to provide storage and allow access for home maintenance and upkeep. Attic doors can come in a variety of fundamental styles for functionality as well as aesthetically. Some basic kinds of attic doors include an attic hatch, an attic hatch with a pull down staircase and a knee-wall door.

The attic hatch is typically just a hole in the ceiling of a home or garage area that has a removable wooden piece in a rectangular or square shape. When accessing an attic with this type of attic door homeowners, typically just remove the covering and push it aside in order to climb into the attic crawl space from a ladder. Attic hatches that have pull-down stairs attached are sometimes known as drop-down attic doors, and they usually can be pulled down with a cord and have stairs made out of a variety of materials, including wood and aluminum. Their outward appearance is very similar to attic hatches without stairs, but they are sometimes installed for convenience. Often with these types of attic doors, a need for insulation or added security measures arises to better protect the homeowner's belongings.

Another kind of door that offers access to attics is the knee-wall door. These types of attic doors are typically found in the vertical position along a wall instead of in the ceiling, and they usually are accompanied by a flight of stairs that enter into a loft-like area or small room that can be used as a bedroom or for storage. Unlike attic hatches, these attic doors are made more like the doors of homes and have a doorknob that allows access.

Some homeowners also have concerns about the aesthetic appearance of attic doors as well, because these access doors are often in dominant places in the house. A basic plywood door can be painted to blend into the décor of the home or possibly wallpapered. Some other options are to have a frame fitted to plywood or to have decoration routed into the surface to match other areas of the home. Other attic doors have a raised panel encompassed by a frame. All of these styles aren't usually thicker than 1.5 inches (3.81 cm) and should not be bulky or heavy in nature so that they can be easily removed while blending in with the home's surrounding décor.