I am never so aware of my lack of interior decorating skills as when I pick out paint colors. No matter how much I study those paint chips I always, ALWAYS, get it wrong. (Well, not always. I insisted on Martha Stewart Bee Balm Red for my office space, and I LOVE IT.)
My dining room had three shades of yellow on it before I found the right one. And even then I made the mistake of painting the ceiling the same color, when it should have been a lighter shade. Some day when I'm feeling brave I'll change it. My bathroom paint was in shades of gray to match the tub, etc. but in that room with so little natural light, the paint looks blue. I hate blue. Our bedroom is a disgusting shade of "antique green" that has a blue tint, and the carpet is a tweed of lighter greens and browns. I let Michael pick that out. I hate it too. The two don't go together at all.
Obviously carpet and I don't do well either. I ripped out the last one we put in, and put in another, and in the past year I have seriously come to not like it either. It's in the living room, and that's the room I'm currently trying to paint. I'm on my third paint color....tested on the small wall the stairs are on...and I hate it. Oh, it is SOOOO wrong.
I am just not cut out for this. It's ovioulsy not in my genes. I'd had the job over to my hubby, but he's not interested....tho he does (USUALLY) make better choices than I do. He stands back and lets me do my thing, and then comes to the rescue with a suggestion that usually works out better than my original plan.
Sometimes I think I'm expecting too much from a little can of color. I would love to have the entire room magically transformed, and paint is not up to the task. The needs of this old house go deeper than any can of paint can fix, and what we really need is discipline....to dig in and get to fixing and finishing all the undone projects around here.
7 comments:
I totally sympathise. Choosing paint is not my forte either, which probably explains why my office is ham pink instead of dusky rose...
Oh thank you...it helps to know I'm not alone!
I tend to stick to off white, tan, beige etc. Mostly it all manages not to clash. *grin*
I think colour scares me when it comes to painting walls. Too many choices, too many chances to get it wrong.
I throw in colour with other things: pillows, pictures, sheets, towels.......
Don't make it such a big deal. Pick out the color that you like the most and go from there. There always seens to be a color that will "jump" out at you, go for it. It's just paint. As you know, you can always try again. Do you have something you are trying to match the color too? They have "color match" you know. Take in a sample and they can match the paint color to it. It's fun! Really! Just keep saying that. It's FUN!!!
lab
No, it's not fun!! I DO pick the color that jumps out at me...that's the problem! It would be better jumping somewhere else. And that's why I keep repainting. Sigh....Do you know how many shades of beige there are??? I have tried about 10 of them so far. I am throwing in the towel and going with "Warm Buff"....Nate says you can't go wrong with that.
with beige the trick is to figure out if you want yellow beige or brown beige. ask the person at the store to show you the difference.
I prefer brown beige, as light as possible. *grin*
I agree, it is hard.
it's me without a sign in
Yes I sympathise too, but I don't think it unreasonable to try a dozen different paint samples before taking a chance on one. We did that with the exterior, but once you slap a tecnicoloured rainbow of slotches on your exterior wall, you had better be committed to choosing something and painting it soon.
We went from beige to reds to yellows and then every shade of green you could think of before settling on the one we did. For the interior, we didn't have the luxury of sampling to goods, instead we experimented with the Benjamin Moore online colour selector. It doesn't matter what paint company you go with, you can generally take your preferred colour into a competitor and ask for the same colour in their brand. Sometimes, then check out the swatches, then the sample paint on the wall or a piece of card that you can tape to the wall. Witht he online thing, try to choose an example room that is the closes to your own - that helps. I enjoy all that kind of thing, but I also find the paint selction thing very stressful, there are so many to choose from, but when you take the time and it all turns out alright, it is really worth it.
in our old plce we wanted warm colours, but had a problem with the down stairs tile, it was a cool greeny blue, the warm colours we chose clashed badly and the place woud not have flowed if I had painted that area a different colour, but I did manage to get a subtle cool version of the same warm colour and no one even noticed it was different. Fun stuff. Good luck with it all.
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