In doors with "panels" (decorative frames), these are usually not symmetrically placed, but the distance of the door panels is longer at one end of the door. The panels can also be different sizes. An old builder explained to me that the narrower distance and the smaller panels should be at the bottom. It sounded upside down to me, but apparently that's how it should be, how it has always been. Five years ago I installed new interior doors, and the pre-installed lock in them was also positioned so that the narrower "margin" to the panel was at the bottom, assuming the doorknob is to be at the top (as it should be). Now I bought another door, the same model from the same hardware store, but now the lock was installed the other way around, so that the wider distance was at the bottom. No major problem to turn the lock the way you want it, but why? Has the standard changed in the last 5 years? How do craftsmen usually do it? Or is it just random?
Another question in the same vein is the door trim (and window trim). In my old house, the trim on the oldest doors is the same as the baseboard, which just bends up 90 degrees and rounds the door, to continue as a baseboard on the other side. The wider side of the trim then naturally ends up against the door opening. In the same way, all later door and window trims have been installed, for the sake of uniformity. However, I have noticed that the rule in most houses seems to be the opposite. It is the tapering part of the trim that faces the opening. Is there any standard here? Justification? I've heard something about wallpapering, but there's the same problem with wallpaper against the baseboard, and that's not turned upside down just to facilitate wallpapering?
