Colors Real and Imaginary

[kybearfuzz]

Now that I have the walls in my living room ready for painting, I'm itching to drag some prospective painters in here and get an estimate. However, I still haven't picked out a color yet and the search for the right shade of this or that is driving me nuts.

Historically, I have not been good at this. My bedroom has been painted four times in the last 16 years. From chocolate brown (my sister's suggestion), to a horrible reddish-brown that looked like make-up, to wedding white (which turned pink-ish in unnatural light), to "harvest brown," the color I finally got that looked good. Such experiences have left me gunshy about what the color looks like at the store and at home.

Behr.com has a paint color selection software tool. It's a fun little program to try out colors in various rooms. The problem is that your limited to the color scheme on your computer monitor. It looks good in the photo, but your monitor may have the colors slightly off. When I went to Home Depot tonight, the color sample cards for the colors I picked out look very different than the online tool. I asked the lady at the paint counter about it, but she said that she would trust the cards more than the online tool.

I went there to get some paint samples to see how they look on the wall, but my i'm not sure if my walls have been painted before, or are they just the drywall. I suspect they are the latter, which irritates me.

So, I'm stuck. Do I pick the colors I like and give it a go? I'm tempted to use "harvest brown" in the living room, since I know what it looks like and it is dead-on the sample card. However, I hate the idea of using the same color throughout so much of the house, even if I like it so much.

Ugh... this is such a pain. Anyone have any ideas that would help?

Comments

Color is important.

[pink_halen]

I have never understood people who paint their homes "Realtor White." However, I have also never understood people who lack imagination to visualize what It might look like in a different color. A friend had his living room painted and impressive dark green. It was beautiful but when he put it on the market, it didn't sell until he had it painted white.

I tend to have lots of color in my life. My living room is three shades of blue while the dining room is "Barn Red." The master bedroom is Gray while the guest room is Lavender. When I bought the place it was oppressively beige.

Pick a color that compliments your furniture and your artwork. Make them look like they belong or visit a furniture store as well as the paint shop.

[dr_tectonic]

Try an accent wall.

Pick one wall and paint it harvest brown, then stop and see how that looks. If it feels like it would be too much to paint the whole room that color (or if you just like it as-is), leave it and and paint the rest of the living room white or a pale neutral color.

(Or if you decide that you don't like it in the living room at all, now you only have to paint over one wall instead of the whole thing.)

[rickps]

My decorator friend (I don't have the gene) made an interesting comment to me... Do you want the walls to be a feature in the room? Or are the furnishings the focus and the walls the background?

[kybearfuzz]

That's an interesting question. And it certainly does help. The walls aren't the feature in my living room, the focus is certainly on other things.