Complimentary Color Schemes The process of picking paint colors for your home may seem totally subjective--you simply select the colors you like. That is merely partly true. Although it makes sense to get started on with the colors you like, other elements come into play. For example, do the colors you've decided on work well collectively? Do they compliment furnishing, carpeting, and draperies already in use? Picking paint colors is actually part art and part science. Let's start with the science part first.
Features of the Color Wheel The color wheel arranges the color spectrum in a circle. It is a sensible way to see which colors work well together. It includes primary colors (red, blue, and yellow), secondary colors (green, orange, violet), and tertiary colors (red-blue, blue-red, and so on). Secondary colors are created 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 produce a tertiary color--in this case, turquoise.
Now that there is a color wheel in front of you, use it to help you envision certain color combinations. An analogous scheme consists of neighboring colors that share an underlying hue.
Complementary colors lie opposite each other on the color wheel and frequently work well in concert. For instance a red and green living room in full strength might be hard to stomach, but look at a rosy pink room with sage green accents. The same complements in differing intensities can make attractive, comforting combinations. A dual complementary color design involves an additional set of opposites, such as green-blue and red-orange.
Alternatively, you might opt for a monochromatic scheme that involves using one color in a variety of intensities. This ensures a harmonious color plan. When developing a monochromatic scheme, lean toward several tints or several shades, but avoid too many contrasting values, that is, combinations of tints and shades. This can make your scheme look uneven.
If you need a more technical palette of three or even 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 side of its complete opposite side of the wheel. For example, instead of teaming purple with yellow, switch the mix to purple with orange-yellow and yellow-green.
Finally, four colors similarly spaced around the wheel, such as yellow/green/purple/red, form a tetrad. If such combinations sound a bit like Technicolor, understand that colors designed for interiors are rarely 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 these two basic camps:
Harmonious or analogous; strategies, derived from nearby colors on the wheel less than halfway around.
Contrasting or complementary; techniques, derived from colors that are directly opposite on the wheel.
Colors for the Interior Don't just choose one color; think in terms of deciding on a color structure. Review your furniture, curtains, window treatments, and rugs, and notice which colors might match them.
Next, take notice of just how many colors you think you might 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. The same is true of other trim, such as home window casings and chair rail.
How about where the walls meet the ceiling? Do you want to install crown molding or some other kind of cornice treatment there? Or are you considering 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 choices range from the most shiny (high gloss and semi-gloss) to the dullest (eggshell and flat). These designations fluctuate with paint producers, but they are important because the sheen of paint affects the color. A guideline states 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 finishes are stronger and better to clean than duller surface finishes.
Think in terms of groups of colors.
Paint manufacturers group like colors together like below:
Interior Color Chips All paint stores provide color chips of the paints they sell. Color chips will give you a small scale idea of what the specific colors can look like once applied. You need to do more than look at color chips to obtain a true sense of your colors... nonetheless they are a good place to start. In fact, a seasoned sales person at your neighborhood 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 person 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, look at the color chips or swatches in several types of light including natural light at different times of the day and in varying degrees of artificial light. Even then, this color chip process is merely to get a concept of paints that you will sample in greater swaths of color. Very few professional designers pick from chips, even though they may start their color selection from chips. If they do examine chips, they examine them one at a time over a white background.
Color Changing Keep in mind that large surface areas make any paint color seem darker than the color chip. The degree of deviation is usually up to two shades. If you pick the color chip you want, step "back" two shades darker for a true representation of what the color can look like when dried out. Also, paint always looks darker once it dries. So, when you finally apply the paint, don't panic if the color doesn't look right initially. Wait around until it dries.
When you are zeroing in on your final colors, paint a 2 x 3 foot poster board or cloth with the anchor color and stick it around the house to enable you to visualize it in various light and near different colored carpets and furniture.
Room Size and Color Colors make a difference how you perceive the size of an area. Warm colors like reds, yellows, and oranges will make a space appear smaller because they provide a cozy feeling to the area. 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 a room seem large go with an old standby like a shade of white (there are dozens) or a neutral color.
Sizing the Room As you get nearer to buying paint, determine the square footage of the room you will paint. Multiply the length of each wall by the width. Subtract the area occupied by the doorways, 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 layers which is normal for most paint jobs, you will be painting the area twice.
Sound Quality Painting
824 90th Dr SE suite B
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(425) 512-7400
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