Colors for Your Home The process of picking paint colors for your home may seem totally subjective--you simply select the colors you like. That is only partly true. While it makes sense to start with the colors you like, other elements come into play. For instance, do the colors you've determined work well together? Do they compliment furnishing, carpeting, and window treatments already in place? Picking paint colors is part skill and part science. Let's focus on the science part first.
Working with the Color Wheel The color wheel arranges the color spectrum in a circle. It is a sensible way to see which colors work very well together. It includes primary colors (red, blue, and yellow), secondary colors (green, orange, violet), and tertiary colors (red-blue, blue-red, etc). Secondary colors are made by mixing two primaries together, such as blue and yellow to make green. A primary color such as blue and a secondary color such as green can be blended to make a tertiary color--in this circumstance, turquoise.
Now that there is a color wheel in front of you, make use of it to help you envision certain color combinations. An analogous design requires neighboring colors that share an underlying hue.
Complementary colors lie opposing each other on the color wheel and often work well in concert. For instance a red and green living room in full intensity might be hard to stomach, but consider a rosy pink room with sage green accents. Similar complements in varying intensities can make attractive, comforting combinations. A double complementary color design involves yet another set of opposites, such as green-blue and red-orange.
Alternatively, you can select a monochromatic scheme that involves using one color in a number of intensities. This ensures a harmonious color plan. When creating a monochromatic plan, lean toward several tints or several shades, but avoid way too many contrasting values, that is, combinations of tints and shades. This can make your design look uneven.
If you need a more complex palette of three or more colors, look at the triads formed by three equidistant colors, such as red/yellow/blue or green/purple/orange. A split complement is composed of three colors- one primary or intermediate and two colors on either part of its complete opposite side of the wheel. For example, instead of teaming purple with yellow, change the mixture to purple with orange-yellow and yellow-green.
Last but not least, four colors similarly spaced about the wheel, such as yellow/green/purple/red, form a tetrad. If such combinations seem a little bit like Technicolor, remember that colors intended for interiors are hardly ever undiluted. Thus yellow might be cream; blue-purple, a dark eggplant; and orange-red, a muted terra-cotta or whisper-pale peach. With less jargon, the color combinations get into both of these basic camps:
Harmonious or analogous; techniques, derived from nearby colors on the wheel less than halfway around.
Contrasting or complementary; strategies, derived from colors that are directly opposite on the wheel.
Interior Paint Schemes Don't just choose one color; think in terms of deciding on a color plan. Study your furniture, curtains, window treatments, and carpets, and take note of which colors might match them.
Next, be aware of how many colors you think you may be using. Will the baseboards be a different color than the walls? They usually are unless the trim is in bad shape and you don't want to call attention to it. Exactly the same will additionally apply to other trim, such as home window casings and couch rail.
How about the area where the walls meet the ceiling? Do you want to install crown molding or various other type of cornice treatment there? Or will you be painting the walls and demarcating the ceiling and wall junction with a color change?
In addition to paint colors, you'll also need to look for the level of finish or sheen the paint will have. The options range from the most shiny (high gloss and semi-gloss) to the dullest (eggshell and flat). These designations fluctuate with paint manufacturers, but they are essential because the sheen of paint impacts the color. A guideline claims that walls usually get flat or eggshell surface finishes whereas ceilings are almost invariably painted with a flat finish. Trim is typically coated with a semi-gloss or high gloss. These surface finishes are more durable and better to clean than duller finishes.
Think in terms of groups of colors.
Paint manufacturers group like colors together like below:
Color Chips for Interior Walls All paint stores can offer color chips of the paints they sell. Color chips will give you a small scale idea of what the actual colors can look like once applied. You will need to do more than look at color chips to obtain a true sense of your colors... nevertheless they are a good place to start. In fact, a seasoned sales rep at your local paint store can help you decide on color chips in a scheme. In the event that you choose a buttercup yellow for the walls, the sales rep can suggest color chips that are usually associated with a design that has buttercup yellow as its anchor color.
When you yourself have whittled down your color selections, go through the color chips or swatches in different types of light including natural light at different times of the day and in varying levels of artificial light. Even then, this color chip process is just to get an idea of paints that you will sample in larger swaths of color. Very few professional designers pick from chips, even though they could start their color selection from chips. If they do examine chips, they examine them individually over a white background.
Changing Color Take into account that large surface areas make any paint color look darker than the color chip. The degree of variance is usually up to two shades. If you select the color chip you want, step "back" two shades darker for a genuine representation of what the color will look like when dried out. Also, paint always looks darker once it dries. So, when you finally apply the paint, don't stress if the color doesn't look right initially. Wait until it dries.
When you are zeroing in on your final colors, paint a 2 x 3 ft. poster board or cloth with the anchor color and stick it throughout the house to enable you to see it in various light and near different colored floor coverings and furniture.
Space and Color Colors can affect the way you perceive the size of an area. Warm colors like reds, yellows, and oranges will make a space seem smaller because they provide a cozy feeling to the space. The so called cool colors like blues and greens appear to recede from you, making a room appear larger than it really is. If you actually want to make an area seem large opt for a vintage standby like a shade of white (there are dozens) or a neutral color.
Estimating Area Size As you get nearer to buying paint, determine the square footage of the area you will paint. Multiply the length of each wall by the width. Subtract the area occupied by the entrances, glass windows, and other openings. Add all the measurements together to obtain a total square footage of the area you must paint. If you're applying two coats which is normal for some paint jobs, you will be painting the surface twice.
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