Ed Rossi finished high school in 1975 and went to work in a small family wood shop. There he learned the woodworking trade and knew it would be his future. After 12 years, Rossi left to start his own company, which eventually became California Door Corp., the wholesale door manufacturer known familiarly as Cal Door.

Cal Door’s business model is to buy best quality lumber direct from the sawmills, obtaining the best pricing possible, then pass the savings along to customers, Rossi says.

Cherry Revere and carved doors (top photo).

The range of door selections is immense. When every option in wood species, stain and design is calculated into the equation, the options runs into hundreds of choices. A catalog of profiles running 21 pages (find it at caldoor.com) includes line drawings of coped doors in French-light mullions, Shaker mullions, more than a dozen applied mouldings for large and flat panels, groove and page after page of solid panel profiles — providing a quick reference and tutorial in the art of woodworking along the way.

In Cal Door’s Arch Gallery a wide selection of radius doors is presented, including cope-n-stick, mitered, and applied moulding style doors. In ready-to-finish, a range of rope decorative touches is offered. Curved doors, sourced from Saint-Georges Doors, come in convex, concave or crossbow models, and are color matched to conventional doors.

Popular in high end kitchens are appliance panels to let refrigerators blend in with the cabinetry. Here Cal Door offerings even include a refrigerator door with drink dispenser opening cut out or with a separate access door.

Cal Door says all its applied moulding doors have mouldings that are glued and press fit — the Napa door in cherry and the Calistoga in maple are two examples. The Revere door (shown) is a Cope ‘N Stick Solid door style. It finishes at 13/16 inch instead of the more common 3/4 inch. A knotty cherry Revere door has a matching drawer front, both in a rustic look.

A video shows the Cal Door manufacturing process.

Cal Door’s Custom carved doors are individually custom carved by Enkeboll Designs into the wood corners on the stiles and rails and the corners of panels. Grape, Oak Leaf and Shell designs are available on stiles and rails in select door styles; panel carvings are offered in any door with an L-panel profile. Carving in one to four corners is available in most woods except softwoods such as pine, poplar and rustic woods. (Enkeboll Designs offers matching corbels and crown moulding.) WoodworkingNetwork.com