We decided it was time to paint. I had always loved the idea of white walls and bright colors, but everyone we talked to told us that would be a terrible idea on our sun-drenched Southern California house. We hired an interior designer to help us with some color ideas and she brought me to Sherwin Williams – where I was absolutely overwhelmed by all the choices. It seemed as if every color went with every other color!
I finally found a blue-gray that I loved and we decided to use this as the main wall color for our living room, dining room, and entryway. But what about the other areas of the house? I wanted a cohesive color story but was feeling lost. I didn’t want all the colors to be too matchy-matchy – so we ended up using the same blue-gray on the stair risers and in our study upstairs. In our master bedroom, we made one wall a different blue-grey that’s slightly warmer to create a deeper color impact.
Here is a breakdown of what I did for my own home:
Living room: I used Benjamin Moore’s Dark Emperador, which was one of my favorite colors from the Sherwin-Williams store that day and looked amazing with my oak floors (which we were replacing soon after) and leather furniture. The walls are a dark blue-gray that has just enough color to not be boring but isn’t too bright.
Dining room: I chose the same Dark Emperador for this room because it’s the perfect amount of color to pull your eye into that space. If you find a color you love – use it everywhere!
Entryway: If you have a lot of natural light in your entryway, consider the color from that room to be an accent wall. In my case, I wanted a hint of blue-gray in this space to help it coordinate with the other spaces downstairs.
This was a simple way to tie together all of the colors downstairs and upstairs. We painted this room Benjamin Moore’s Harbor Blue – a light blue-gray that is slightly brighter than the other colors and makes you feel like you’re looking outside (a bright, happy space). One of my favorite things about this color story: it works with our existing furniture and accessories.
Creating a color story for your home is a great idea, and the team at Ethereal Painters would love to help! Give them a call at 604-788-3382 or fill out our estimate form on our website.