This Overlooked Exterior Detail Is Not Just For Curb Appeal

When it comes to exterior home design, the smallest details can make the biggest difference. You can have stunning landscaping, a striking facade, and a welcoming driveway, but if you've overlooked this small detail, you're not only losing a curb-appeal element that conveys your home's personality, but more importantly, you're neglecting a critical safety feature. While it may be small, your house number needs to stand out.

The main thing that must be visible to first responders at your home in an emergency situation is your house number. Precious seconds are lost when emergency personnel can't find your home by its number or it's difficult to read.

An easy-to-find and read house number not only ensures that first responders can find your home, though, but also, day to day, delivery people, mail carriers, and friends. Further, an attractive and visible house number is actually one of the creative ways to increase your home's curb appeal. The look of your house number could even influence a buyer's first impression of your home and its value.

When considering house number visibility factors, look at size, contrast, placement, and lighting. Aside from these elements, don't neglect the possibilities of your house number's aesthetic aspects, too, like its font and color.

Have you looked at your house number from the curb to see if you can read it? Perhaps it was visible at one time but has faded or become obscured by shrubbery. House number visibility is so important that many local jurisdictions have minimum size requirements, typically ranging from 3 to 6 inches tall. Some even mandate a minimum thickness (or "stroke") of the characters, usually half an inch. For best visibility, house numbers should be in a color that contrasts with the background they're on. If the background is a light color, the number should be a dark color, and vice versa. 

The best spot to place your house number for maximum curb appeal is on the house, but you may need to adjust that placement if your house is set far back from the road or the number is otherwise not visible. In those situations, it makes sense to have secondary signage with your house number closer to the road.

It's also always a good idea to include your house number on your mailbox, but be sure the number appears on both sides so that it can be seen from either direction. A gate can be a tempting spot for a house number, meanwhile, but one wrinkle is that it will only work (be visible) if the gate is closed.

You should also consider the nighttime visibility of your house number and whether first responders can see the number in darkness and low-visibility weather conditions. The ideal scenario is dedicated lighting (like a spotlight) for the number, or a porch light that illuminates it. Alternatives to lighted numbers include house numbers with a reflective finish or ones that are backlit.

Once you've considered safety precautions with your house number(s), you can feel free to inject some creativity into this navigational home feature. The possibilities are nearly endless, and could include a house number woodworking DIY, a house number display made from repurposed thrifted plates, or a DIY flower box with house numbers. You could also consider spelling out your house number in words instead of numerals.

For the font, choose one that appeals to you, aligns with your home's architecture, and is easy to read. For decades, typographers and designers have argued that serif fonts — i.e., those with little curlicues or strokes on the letters — are easier to read than sans serif fonts. But a study published in Vision Research found the difference virtually negligible, so that might open up the font selection even more.

That said, since sans serif fonts tend to look more modern than serif fonts, a sans serif font on a Victorian home, for example, may be seen as a mismatch. Meanwhile, script fonts suit an elegant aesthetic but can be hard to read.

We've curated our favorite ways to creatively display house numbers to inspire your house number ideation. Be sure you test out visibility from the street of any choice you make. Don't forget to also gauge whether your house number can be seen from the street at night.