I love Kathy Wilson's decorating ideas and always read them. This week's article about Wall Colors is right on time. Have you read it?

I'm going to paint my bathroom within the next couple of weeks and had been thinking of a certain shade of green, but I've been a little hesitant because the bathroom is small. I'm inspired now! 

I don't have a white wall in my home. Color color color in every room. I will say this, Green is tricky because there are so many variations, tones, shades etc. You have greens with undertones of yellow, blue, black and brown. I'm not talking you out of green but a friend and I both had issues with getting a light green. We had sage in mind and ended up with mint. She's the one who discovered the undertone thing and told me about it. I have a sage green in my upstairs hallway that matches an older lineolium tile. It took time to get the exact match.

 Yep. I've brought home fistfuls of samples that looked right in the store, but looked awful in the bathroom. I have some yarn that is the right color and I think I'll take it and see if they can match it. I'm going for white and something like waht we used to call olive green, but closer to sage, but not so pale. See? Can't even define it!  Peachy tan will go with it, since my floor is that color of tile. 

I loved that rich bronze/brown picture she included in the article. Brown is really a color i have never used, except for diluted shades of khaki. 

I have had troubles with light blue. My bathroom ended up looking lilac rather than a "dusty" blue. And our living room when we first were married ended up a depressing gray rather than a cheery light blue. But I try to use colors because it adds interest in an inexpensive way. In our living room (now repainted), our focal wall is a deep navy blue while the other walls are a creamy tan. It showcases the fireplace and one wall doesn't make the room too dark.

The new house is mostly neutral--but not white or off white, more khaki and yellow-- except a blue bedroom (my son's room), a blue bathroom and a teal dining room. I'm leaving everything alone except the dining room. Too loud for me for dinner! The powder room on first floor is a bright red! It's really neat for such a small space. The basement family room is painted a basic off white but the carpet is a rich tan and the fireplace is red brick. With our Nebraska Cornhusker Football posters--we will add the color, lol.

I have leftover paint, especially that lilac bathroom color, and I used it to paint closets. Our closets were pretty worn and the lilac doesn't look so purple-y in the small space. It actually looks light blue!

Ok, I know this will sound a bit wierd... but I have white in my bedroom on purpose. I find it simple and calming. 1/2 my upstairs hallway is white while the other is Muted Gold. My guest bedroom is chocolate on one wall and Carmel on the other 3. The Muted gold goes 1 wall into the living room. I have the rest of the living room white also but its covered by a fabric piece I picked up in Nairobi and pictures so it doesn't need color. My kitchen is called "Summer fun" blue... think of the "blue screen of death" and go brighter. This was the bravest color I've gone with and I love it! Downstairs is still white with a duck border, from the previous owner, and no $ in budget (dad's) to fix that up, and no need since I never go down there really. Bathrooms are an antique white and those are fine w/ me. (Downstairs 1/2 bath has more of a brown pattern in it).

 

You can always tell when I'm contemplating a new color because I have those color samples stuck to the walls for weeks on end. I'm always checking to see how the color looks in various stages of natural and artificial light. Its pretty easy at first to eliminate the ones that don't work but the last two or three take me extra time. My friend (I mentioned earlier) was notorious for buying several quarts one at a time, testing a large space on a wall and 9 times out of 10 hating it.

mamasjob:

I loved that rich bronze/brown picture she included in the article. Brown is really a color i have never used, except for diluted shades of khaki. 

 

I liked that picture, too.

Luvd_Lioness:

. but I have white in my bedroom on purpose. I find it simple and calming.

My dining area is white, even down to the floor (the floor was NOT my idea!) except for the wood on the chair seats and tabletop. I like it because I can change it to suit the season or my mood just by changing the curtains and tablecloth.  

 

Toni B.:

My friend (I mentioned earlier) was notorious for buying several quarts one at a time, testing a large space on a wall and 9 times out of 10 hating it.

I'm too cheap to spend the money on a whole quart of paint!   I have quite a variety of paint samples now. I wonder if there's anything I can do with them??

 

 

I like white walls. But I also love dark wood furniture and black iron. White walls set that off nicely with splashes of red, gold or other colors in accent pieces.

 

 I have bright white cupboards in my kitchen (we painted them!)  and I painted the walls a cherry blue with a sea green sponged on top.  it turned out really cheerful.

I must confess, I generally take the opposite approach. I figure white (well, off-white) walls go with everything, so if I ever decide to make a change in the decor, I can just swap out the textiles instead of repainting. It's all very well for her to say, "It's only paint and you can always change it," but painting a room is a lot of work, and I'd rather not do it more than once. I actually felt like I was being very bold by going with a creamy yellow for the basement room rather than some variant of white--though when we tested it out on the wall, I discovered that from some angles you can hardly even tell it's a yellow and not just another off-white. I'm hoping it will look a bit more vivid once we've done the whole large room with it.