You will all be starting to think that we have misspelt our company name on the site, and that it is really Artchitectural Classics – or perhaps that we are on the payroll of the UK Centre for the Arts – with yet another post on architecture-related art.

Luminox in Oxford a couple of months ago is the subject. Like the Salt Mines in Poland, or the Ice hotel in Sweden complete with chandeliers, this post makes you wish you had been there… It was the creation of a French artist, Carabosse, and basically involved turning off all electric light to Oxford Square from around 7pm, and lighting the hundreds of firepots and fire-powered chandeliers that hung around the square.

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Well! The BBC does have a sense of humour, of sorts … ;-) Just kidding, you’re great! In their h2g2 offshoot site, under The Guide to Life, the Universe and Everything (the name is an adapted version of Douglas Adams’ book of similar title), they have a guide to knocking on doors! Alex Ashman has managed to track down an impressive grand total of fifteen reasons that somebody might knock on a door – for your reference and satisfaction of curiosity here they are (thankyou Alex):

The following are times when it is usually appropriate to knock on a door:

1. As a way of asking to enter through the door.
2. As a way of asking to speak to someone.
3. As a way of getting someone to open the door so that an oversized object such as a parcel can be delivered to them.
4. To get someone’s attention so that you can shout a message to them through the door while not expecting a reply.
5. In order to wake someone up in the morning.
6. As a way of determining if the person who is going to let you through is actually on the other side of the door or if you’re going to be stuck out in the cold for a rather long time.
7. As a way of getting the people on the other side to stop making as much noise.
8. In order to enquire whether there is someone in the room already, for example in a toilet.
9. As part of a futile bid for freedom after trapping a limb in the closing door of a London Underground train.
10. As a means of indicating that you would rather like to leave somewhere as a matter of urgency.
11. To let someone know that their chimney is on fire.
    
12. To determine whether the door is secure against potential burglars.
13. To be generally very irritating. An example of this is knocking on the door and then leaving quickly so that there is nobody around when the door is opened. This is commonly known as ‘knock down ginger’ and ‘knock and run’.
14. To determine whether a wooden door is hollow.
15. To bring good luck and ward off evil spirits - in European culture the act of knocking on wood is lucky.

I believe, even in this electronic, information overloaded age, it is rare to find such an in-depth guide on such a mundane subject. Therefore, we’ve got to follow it up! I read the Guide to Knocking on Doors with door-knockers in mind, and came up with several points of difference between the two techniques.

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Locks are a precision instrument, and mortice locks are one of the trickier varieties to maintain and fit! However, that makes it that much more satisfying when you fit one that works properly. Mortice locks are used for most inside doors, which makes it not so imperative that you do an excellent job, as there really isn’t a security issue. Remember to measure twice and cut once, and you can’t go too far wrong!

The first step is to decide how high up the door you want the lock to be – this will depend on whether children need to be able to open it … or need to be unable to open it! Put the lock against the broad part of the door and draw in pencil around its body, and mark on the door where the keyhole and spindle holes are in relation to the drawing. The pencil should rub off with normal eraser without any damage. Make sure you measure the location on the lock, and then measure the same distance on the drawing, rather than guessing by eye. You can then use a set square (two rulers set at exactly ninety degrees to each other) to draw lines along the narrow edge of the door where the top and bottom will be.

Next, measure the thickness of the door, along the narrow edge, determine the halfway point and mark it. Put the centre-back of the lock on the centre line and draw around it – this is the part to be cut out. Drill a row of holes in the narrow edge of the door, the same thickness as the lock. Measure the lock and then pop some electrical tape on your drill bit to make sure that you go deep enough.

Use a chisel to get the rounded edges of the row of holes out. Clean out the splinters also. Chisel out as much as you need to until the lock fits inside, then push the lock in until you can draw around the face plate. You can then chisel a recess of 1-2 mm, or however deep your face plate is, to make it flush with the edge of the door.

Drill out the spindle hole and key hole from the broad side of the door. This is the nerve-wracking bit! Fit the spindle, and test it and the key. When things are working from that side, use a bradawl to start off the screw holes in the narrow side of the door, then screw the face plate on. Fit the handles on the spindle.

To place your striker plate on the door frame, partially close the door and mark where the top and bottom of the door catch is. Fully close the door and measure how far it is from the catch to the edge of the frame. Use your marks and measurements to determine where to chisel out a hole for the catch – then you can fit the striker plate over the top of it.

It almost sounds too easy, doesn’t it! We’d love to know how you managed, if you have tried fitting your own mortice locks.