Decorating Poll: Paint color

Kalani

I was just wondering if anyone has painted the walls in your home.  Honestly, most of our circle of friends and family members have white walls. 

I'd like to paint maybe some of the walls in the house.  Wondering if you have painted walls and what color did you use?  Did you consider your furniture and overall color scheme?  I am one who likes to change comforter sets and decor based on the season, so I'm kinda nervous about painting the walls when we move in (thinking it may not match).

PIPs would be great!     Thx!

Snarling Fox

We just had our living room repainted. Went with some lighter pastel colors - like a warm beige/tan with an orangey/pink undertone. So far the living room is unfurnished (thanks to a neighbor's tree causing some renovations and a very bad kitty) so no considerations for furniture/decor other than trying to keep it neutral for whatever we decide to put it. MH and I are kind of boring in that sense.

Also, I found that it helped to get some of the paint swatches and take them home and tape them to the wall. After a few days of looking at them with the actual light in the room, I have a better feeling for what the color. For me, it's hard to tell what the color will look like under the store's flourscent lights. If it's not too much trouble or costly, you could also get a small can of paint in the color you're considering and put it on the wall.

*I'm super late since I haven't been keeping up with the board - but congratulations on your new house!

Kalani

Thanks for the information and the congrats! 

I think that I know that neutral colors are probably the way to go and we are in the same situation in which we will need to pretty much fully furnish this new house (slowly; we're not getting in debt over furniture).   But I want to be brave and bold and not be so safe. I've seen decorating shows on TV where they have been pretty bold in the paint and decor choices.  But knowing me, I'm going to want to change things seasonally.  So I probably do need a neutral color for paint.  (Sigh)

redshoegirl

We completely repainted the condo I had in the last city we lived in - white throughout the living areas (boring I know but it was a tiny place and the white really helped make the rooms look bigger), yellow for the main bedroom (sounds crazy but it grew on you!) and a beautiful grey blue that I still love for the second bedroom.

At our current place, all the rooms had been repainted recently in neutral colors...but we did paint the nursery and Ben's man den the same shade of a kind of pale aqua (looks more green in some lights, more blue in others).

Our furniture is all fairly neutral - lots of espresso wood, our couches are beige, etc. - so we didn't really worry about that when choosing colors. 

redshoegirl

Oh, sorry, you asked for PIPs!

OK - here are the two bedrooms at our old place (please ignore the hideous carpet - we were going to tear it up but never got around to it) - you're going to have to scroll to the right, sorry...

 Main bedroom with the yellow:

 This blue was a bit more grey than it looks in this photo:

 

 And this is the color of the nursery and Ben's man den - well sort of, it's not a very good photo and in real life the color is brighter (not darker, just brighter) and more aqua, closer to what you see in the second photo:

 

Kalani

Thanks, Lisa!  The PIPs really help.  I LOVE the colors in your home.  The wall color in the boys' room is really nice.  I really like that.  I'm also appreciating the yellow in your bedroom.  It's really cool. 

BTW, I love your bed frame.  That is totally my style. 

vanilla15

First let me say, I am definitely not afraid of color....maybe to a fault.  The only thing painted white in my house is the ceiling!  I think after a decade in apartments with all white walls, I just couldn't do it anymore.  Every room in my house is a different shade of blue!  The main living room (kitchen, dining room & living room - really just one big room) is Light Silver Sage from Restoration Hardware (though I had it color matched at Sherwin Williams b/c it was cheaper b/c my contractor had an account with SW & I also wanted everything in zero VOCs paint which RH didn't offer).  This color is definitely my most "neutral".  From there I found a SW color similar and just kept going up the color wheel - i.e. my master bed, which is a room off of the main room, is one step up and then in my master bed is a lead in to the Master Bath which is another step up the color wheel. 

In all fairness, I am from New Orleans & people don't really shy away from color here.  I went with blue b/c I really love the color, but also b/c it seemed like everyone was going with different shades of yellow & I wanted to be different!

I don't have a hard time changing up my accents from season to season, but that is just me.

I dont' have any pics on this computer, but I will try to take some & post them here for you!

Amy4773

I loooooooove color!  When I owned my home by myself, every room was a different color.  Kitchen - red, living room - 2 shades of teal, office - tangerine, bathroom - sage, guest room - yellow, bedroom - khaki.  I loved it! 

Our current house hasn't been given nearly as much love.  Our bedroom is the same khaki ("happy trails" from Pittsburgh Paint), I have 2 accent walls in our great room in a chocolate raspberry color, my stepson's room is a bluish color (with the leftovers I painted the laundry room as well) and my stepdaughter's room is bright-a$$ pink on one wall and will be grey on the others.

Maybe this post will motivate me to paint the rest of the walls!!!

Married2MrWright

DH and I absolutely cannot stand white walls!  We're renters, but always have color on our walls.  This house came with each room painted a carmel color with white trim so we've just gone with that, since it's not white.  But before this place we've had:

House before this:

• Sage green bathroom and kitchen
• Golden living room, bedroom and hallway
• Sky Blue second bedroom

House before that:

• Golden Yellow living room/dining room with a red accent wall between the two
• Golden Yellow bathroom
• Mocha Brown bedroom with a deep teal accent wall

House before that:

• Red dining room
• Burnt Orange kitchen/family room
• Mocha Brown bedroom with a deep teal accent wall

Apartment before that:

• Red and Yellow Kitchen
• Caramel Living/Dining Room with a Plum Accent Wall
• Periwinkle Bathroom
• Teal accent wall in the bedroom

We have an ecclectic collection of furniture and artwork but the main color scheme is red, teal, and gold with black accents.  Our wood tends to be dark wood (except Libby's room where it's painted white or a lighter cherry/golden oak color). Our sofa is gold and we have a few deep red chairs and things.  We have an area rug that is gold with red, teal, sage, cream, tan and navy in it.

Before J and I were together I had a lot of plum/deep purple decor and accents. Once we moved in together, we decorated our bedroom with photo art prints from Kauai and we have tropical bedding so we usually stick with a teal paint color that makes the art "pop."  We have a few duvets that I change in/out put all match the tropical theme and carry the chocolate/teal theme with pops of color like orange, red and yellow.  Our kitchen stuff is red and I have a small "retro-cherry" collection going on there so that's why our kitchens tend to be green and/or yellow with red accents.

I have some pics somewhere, but not accessible at this time.  The beauty of paint is it's a relatively cheap way to make a huge impact on your decorating.  We always DIY (we're pros at painting now) and in a weekend we have completely transformed our living spaces.

 

MauiBride2008

I love paint!

Infact, I'm rady to re-paint!   The majority of our house is a beige/tan color, but I think it's too dark and dingy so I'm actually going to re-paint to a lighter and brighter beige.  We have a red wall in our living room/kitchen (it's a joining wall) that I'm about ready to remove.  Although I love the red and I'm happy with the red I chose, I'm just ready for a change.  Our MB is called Silvermist by Sherwin Williams (similar to the Silver Sage by RH) and I LOVE it!  It changes so much with the sun, but I do have more natural color bedding.  In DD bathroom we did a lime green color to set the tone for a surfer style bathroom, that's been fun.

I have pics in my bio (link in siggy), but I have none that are updated for our MB...I have just been too lazy. 

Don't be afraid of color, it's just paint...it can always be changed if you don't like it and it's the cheapest fix when you want to change up a room

lelekay

Oh, I paint EVERYTHING!!!  I prefer more neutral fabrics and furniture (white bedding, tan or beige sofas) with colorful walls.  Right now the house is:

Living room = deep golden yellow

Kitchen = sage green

Nursery = light blue

Guest room = mocha

Office/Study = deep, but muted green (the color of Gumby, but more muted!)

Master Bedroom  = cobalt blue

Bathroom  = one red wall, the rest tan

Family room = camel

I'm at work, therefore no PIPs right now, but maybe I can later this weekend.  

MauiWedding08

I love color - painting was one of the things I was totally looking forward to after buying a house.  But the house we ended up buying already had nice colors so I haven't done a whole lot.  I like cool colors and aqua/turquoise is my all time favorite color - I don't change out things seasonally.

I did paint the living room Mt. Rainier Grey by Benjamin Moore.  On a sunny day it's very pretty blue (as the picture shows) on a cloudy day or at night it's a lot more grey.

 

I painted Baby's room a bright aqua (much like the Tiffany & Co color) don't remember the name off the top of my head by Benjamin Moore

 

You can see how all accent each other (with a light kiwi entry way, not sure what color this is, it was already there)

 

other colors here when we purchased the house.

Khaki color in the guest room the adjoining bath has tan floor tiles and and terra cotta and dark grey color tiled shower, black granite-y sink surrounding tiles, warm wood cabinets and a terra cotta accent wall. (surprisingly warm colors in an other wise cool color house)

 

kitchen, hallway, dining, and extra seating area are a very nice pale grey.

MB is the lightest of light shade of aqua, you can barely see the difference until you compare with the white trim

MB is light grey/tan/beige to accent the tile work.

 

basement is neutral beige (a little ligher than this when all the lights are turned on)

myday1708

We painted.

Living Room: Sage green

Kitchen: Yellow

Dining Room: Dark Blue and white with white chair rail

Hallway: Beige

Nursery: Bright green

We had an idea of what colors we wanted but were overwhelmed with the choices in each shade, so we just went with the Pottery Barn selections for each color. Love how it came out!

You can see pics in the blog I am doing for my friend's kid's Flat Stanley project... Scroll to the first post and it's sort of a tour of our house.

http://flatstanleylambchopindc.blogspot.com/

MauiBride2008

myday1708:

You can see pics in the blog I am doing for my friend's kid's Flat Stanley project... Scroll to the first post and it's sort of a tour of our house.

http://flatstanleylambchopindc.blogspot.com/

This is cute!   And great paint colors!

Kalani

Thank you everyone for your great descriptions as well as the PIPs.  It's amazing to see and to hear described the variety that you have in your homes.  I honestly can't recall anyone that I know personally w/ painted walls! 

BTW, you all have beautiful homes and decorating styles.

KShiz

We painted.  Mostly we stuck to a yellow/gray color scheme: yellow for the living room & baby's room and grandma cave downstairs. Gray for the kitchen & hallways. We did a robins egg blue in the master bedroom. It sounds kind of like a mishmosh, but the scheme came out pretty cottage-y, which is what we were going for.  And gray sounds like a drab color to paint, but it works really well as a backdrop for the white cabinets we got for the kitchen.

You can see the yellow and greys in here:  

http://crybabyink.blogspot.com/2009/07/paper-walls.html

The wallpaper in the corner built in is what I was talking about in the BHG blurb a few months back.

and the grandma cave here:

http://crybabyink.blogspot.com/2009/08/nifty-thrify.html

The actual grandma cave is not nearly as obnoxiously yellow as it looks in the picture  

Surfinbride

Funny, my color taste is the same as MauiWedding. Our bedroom is SW lavender-blue, which is slightly lighter than her room. I had that color 12 years ago in a different house. It was gorgeous. I decided to paint it in this house. Oops. The old house had nice, thick bright white molding and white doors. This house has cheap, light-colored wood doors (maple) and molding. If you do not have white molding/doors, make sure that you do a tester of paint and put it next to the door. The lavender-blue made the wood look really yellow. It makes sense - they are opposite on the color wheel.

Most of our house is neutral. My favorite break from white is Limoge Cream. I think it is made by SW. It is still very light (not beigey tan), but warmer than white. The rest of the house is a blah color that I don't love - I think it is called Oyster Shell or Ride Pudding from Kelly Moore. It is a sandy color. Not thrilling.

Have you gone on the Decorating and Renovating board? They are great. Many of them have bios with all of their house pics. They even have a paint bio. Write a post over there and you'll get lots of ideas.

plumeriapal

I love color and I love to paint. I'm jealous that you have a fresh canvas of a house

I consider three things when picking colors: 1) What is the room being used for and what do I want to feel while I'm in that room, 2) What colors make up the natural surroundings - what can you see through your windows, what kinds of trees and flowers bloom in the area, what's the natural light like a majority of the time (sunny, shaded, gray, etc) and 3) After picking a color scheme, pick up paint samples and paint cheap posterboards and hang them on the walls. Check back frequently throughout the day to see which shades work and which ones don't.

For our mainland house, I went with our desert views - beige landscape, joshua trees and agave plants, blue skies, and spectacular sunsets. We have an open floor plan so we made the lving area, dining room, kitchen and entry way a cooler khaki color with accent walls and drapes in a warm chocolate brown. Trim was done in a soft white. We kept our furniture fairly neutral as well but accented with watery blues and greens and soft lavendars and oranges. My office was painted a soothing spa green (to help me de-stress, ha!) and my desk was ebony.

Since we're originally from the NW, the desert sun felt so harsh to us that we wanted to make our bedroom a dark, cozy cave. We went with a dark charcoal grey feature wall and lighter gray walls. We pulled a pale lavendar from our bedspread and used that in our attached master bath. We also carried the gray from the bedroom into the bathroom floor tiles.

We got kinda burned out by the time we made it to the guest bath and bedrooms. Plus we had to work with the existing bath vanity. So we painted the bathroom a deep, warm lavendar and then went with a neutral platinum color for the bedrooms.

When we moved to Hawaii, we could only move some of our belongings. I pulled everything I owned that was green (my favorite color!) to take with us. Since we didn't know where we would be living, having one color as an accent was so easy and affordable. Now we're surrounded with neutral furnishings and walls with pops of green. Very fresh and tropical and perfect for all the sunny, natural light we have.

Good luck with your paint projects! Can't wait to see pics!