In this chapter you will learn how to decide on the right colour scheme for your rooms.

A room rarely has the perfect light and proportions, so we need to cheat. This section will also show you how to make the most of what you have!

 

Before you buy a pot of paint, buy interior design magazines and start a folder with the pictures of rooms that appeal to you. Also go onto Pintrest and find rooms that you like and put them in folders.

Make lists of the predominant colour combinations that seem to attract you.

Look in your wardrobe and decide which colours, and tints and saturations you are drawn to. This all links with your own personal style. For instance, if you are a ‘feminine’ your wardrobe will have soft pastel colours, and you are unlikely to feel comfortable in a home with bright yellow and lime green walls.

Our clothes need to co-ordinate with our home colours, just as the plants seen from your window compliment your room. It all creates a harmonious feel of continuity, nothing jars.

Some people will think this is rather extreme. The decision is entirely yours, do what you feel comfortable with.

Combine all this with what you learnt in the chapter on your personal style, the psychology of colour, and whether you are a warm or cool colour person, and you should be well on your way.

Some popular colour combinations are-

White on white.

This only works when combined with different textures and finishes. Four example -high gloss for tiles, semi matt wall paint. matt leather settee, white fur rug, silver metal for the furniture, mirrors.

It is a very dramatic look that used to be the height of fashion.

White and black

As above, but black skirting board, black settee, black and white rug.

 

White, black and one other colour

As above, but , for example, bright red cushions, feature wall, paintings. Dramatic and not so extreme a the previous two.

Monochromatic

This is shades of one colour, but it needs to be extreme, so the walls almost white with just a touch of green in them, dark green, almost black settee,, mid green carpet.

This is hard to pull off, and easier if matched with black and white.

I saw a mayors office that had the same shade of mid blue walls, velvet curtains, and carpet, it looked awful!!

 

Neutral

Avery popular choice, usually shades of beige and brown it can look classy, but it can also look boring. Light beige walls, mid brown carpet, dark brown settee, patterebed brown/beige/cream cushions and curtains.

 

Neutral with a zing of one other colour.

 

As with the above neutral, but bright red cushions/rug/ornaments. This is more interesting.

Inspirations for colour schemes.

Few of us have the opportunity of starting from scratch. We usually have existing furniture or carpet we have to work with.

For example, if you have a patterned rug in tones of moss green with black and white, you could either-

a- match the green exactly and use that colour on a feature wall with white or on the other walls. Warm the room up with peach cushions, curtains, lamps etc

b-take tones, tints or shades of the green. Have pale green on all four walls, light green carpet, and dark green skirting boards.

c-go to the complementary and have a bright red feature wall, white on the others

d-go to the split complementary with a red/orange wall or accessories

e-go to the triadic with green walls and orange soft furnishings.

 

The variations and permutations are endless!

 

Project

To design a guest bedroom with an oriental theme in colours that matched a large Chinese silk painting. Special importance had to be given as to how the room was seen from the outside, as it was close to the road, and next to the drive.

The room did not have any storage, and as it was not very large I decided that it needed mirror-fronted cupboards beside and over the bed. This would make the room seem larger, and lighter.

 

 

We wanted to refelct the oriental of the painting feel in the room.

 

My client fell in love with this peach material, when I showed it to her. The colours were a great match, and the pattern was wonderful.

 

There was a matching plain material in the same range. When I ordered the material I specified that the peach colours in both the plain and patterned material must match. Each time a fabric run is made, the colours vary slightly, so it is best to specify that they are going to be used in the same project, even if it means waiting a bit longer until the next run.

I used it for the curtain and bedspread, a matching plain cotton was used for the swags, tie-backs and edging. Because the room was seen from the drive we lined the curtains with a peach anti-fade lining. A paler version of the

colour went on the walls. The colour I had initially chosen looked too bright, so I toned it down with some magnolia [a beige coloured] paint.

I used a matching border, in the same colours, at dado height, to link the separate elements of the room together.

The Chinese paintings were framed with a gold metal, to pick-up the gold in the material. I designed a peach silk flower arrangement with gold -sprayed bamboo, in keeping with the oriental feel. To give it extra height I stood it in a plain white, ceramic umbrella stand. This stood in the corner.

We decided to keep the off-white wool carpet. This added to the light and spacious feel of the room.

In autumn the inside outside flow was enhanced by the copper-coloured foliage of the beach tree outside the window.

 

The finished room met all my client’s requirements. There was ample storage space; the peach and green matched the Chinese paintings; the room appeared larger and lighter, and looked good from the road.

When you have decided on the colours that you like, your next decision is where to use them in the room. For example, take the combination of red, black, white and grey.

 

 

 

 

Feature skirting

wall walls board carpet curtain settee cushions

black	pale grey	white	white	white	red	white
red	white	black	grey	white	black	red
white	white	red	grey	black	black	red
red	white	black	white	grey	grey	red
grey	white	white	black	red	grey	black
white	white	grey	red	black	red	grey
					black	red

 

And that is just using plain colours, imagine the permutations when you add pattern into the equation!

 

Before you start decorating, there are a few rules you need to know that will make mistakes less likely.

What goes and what stays

Remember the first time that you walked into this room, what were your first impressions? If there was something that was irritating [or downright ugly] can you remove or disguise it? Use paint colour, an ugly feature can be minimised by painting it the same colour as it’s surrounds, or a light colour.

 

Don’t go making extra work for yourself!

Your room may look bland, and only need a feature wall painted.

Redecorating an entire room can be time-consuming, so if all you want is a quick way of changing the mood of a room without redoing the entire colour scheme, designate yourself a feature wall and start painting!

A feature wall is simply one wall picked out as an accent by painting it in a different colour and or texture to the rest of the room. If you have a predominantly neutral colour scheme, a feature wall is the perfect opportunity to add a splash of colour without overpowering the rest of the room scheme that you have worked hard to achieve. While feature walls are most commonly used as a highlight in a neutral schemed room, they can also be used to define space in open plan areas rather than having expanses of the same colour for the entire area.

One way to select the wall is to walk into the room and decide which wall naturally attracts your attention the dominant wall, preferably one with interesting angles, curves, a fireplace or interesting lighting. It is generally best to avoid walls with windows and doors, as these will detract attention from the feature you are creating.

Use the feature wall to mount pictures and mirrors to make it look more dramatic. Fit up-lighters or down lighters for impact at night.

In a bedroom the wall behind the bed usually makes the best feature wall, and can be painted a bright colour that won’t disturb your sleep.

You can select a favourite colour or use existing furnishings as inspiration and select a feature colour from the room’s curtains, furniture, artworks or floor rugs.

If you are looking for something a little more unique, be a bit more adventurous and experiment with a sparkling metallic finish, a sand or suede finish, or a paint effect [sponging, rag-rolling, dragging etc.] finish. Unfortunately if you don’t like the texture of the suede or metallic paints, you will have to sand it off to repaint. If you don’t like the colour you can just paint over the top.

A feature wall will have a dramatic effect on the whole room.

Remember, a dark colour will make the feature wall advance and appear closer, while a lighter shade will make the wall recede and appear further away. If you want to make a long room appear squarer, paint the far wall in a dark colour to draw the wall into the room.

As colours are influenced by other room colours, and lighting, it is always best to trial your chosen colour using a testpot on the actual area you are planning to paint. View the painted area at different times of day to ensure that you like the colour as it changes from day to night.

It only takes a few litres to create a feature wall, which means it can be easily changed to suit your mood, the season or a change in decorating plans. Don’t be afraid to allocate one wall as a permanent feature wall and change it regularly as your tastes and colour trends develop. Feature walls are designed for you to experiment with colours, so make the most of the blank canvas – after all you can always repaint if you don’t like the first colour you choose!

 

 

 

Project-to make a statement in this lounge, by adding a feature wall.

This was a light room decorated in shades of pink. It was lacking impact, so I decided to make the wall between the windows a feature wall, and paint it a dark browny-pink.

 

I felt that the wall was a little bit over-powering, so I did two large white pieces of art, and the white jacket [ see ‘Making the money go further’ for details]

I painted another piece of art in a mid pink, which matched the silk cushions I had specially made. I sponged the coffee table with the left over paint.

The white flokati rug on the floor was the finishing touch that pulled the whole room together.

 

 

 

 

As you can see, the feature wall gave the room impact.

 

 

Or you could buy-

bright cushions for the settee,

new tie-backs for the curtains

Or a new rug for the floor.

 

This is a much quicker and cheaper option than painting all four walls. Conversely you may have appalling curtains, change those and the rest of the room may work for you. Trying to work with the existing carpet will save you the most money. The carpet may only look so terrible because of the colours of the walls. Change those and it may improve enough to make you want to keep it.

 

What faults need to be minimised, and what features need to be enhanced?

 

Small rooms

To make a room look larger, decorate in light colours that reflect the light. Use a full or semi-gloss paint finish. Cool colours, or tints of cool colours makes rooms appear larger. Use mirrors, either one large, or several smaller, or mirror tiles.

Large rooms

This is not such a common problem, usually we are trying to make rooms look larger! But if you have a converted warehouse, loft or barn, you can feel rather lost in so much space.

To make a room seem smaller you use dark colours to close in the space. This creates the effect of closing in the ceiling and walls, and gives a cosy effect.

To make walls advance you use a combination of dark and warm colours. If you paint the back wall dark, and the rest of the room is light, the back wall will advance. A dark floor and light walls makes the floor seem small.

Make separate areas more obvious with different colour feature walls, distinct furniture groupings, with their own rugs and lighting.

Long narrow spaces

To change the overall proportions of a long, narrow hallway, paint the ceiling and floor in a darker colour than the walls. This is useful for long narrow kitchens and corridors. Paint the far end, shorter walls in a darker colour and the room will appear squarer.

To make a wall recede, paint it in a cool colour, with the walls and ceiling a warm colour. This is useful to disguise any feature that you wish wasn’t there- part of a knocked down wall, or supporting column, for example.

High ceiling

To lower a high ceiling use a colour darker than the walls. It can be extended down to a picture rail level, to make it appear even lower. Put on a dado , either a wooden or plasrte trim, paper, or a stencil.. Paint [or paper] below the dado to help break-up the wall height.

Low ceiling

To raise a high ceiling use a lighter colour than the walls.

Paint the dado to match the carpet to make the floor area seem larger.

 

When choosing paint colour, remember that small samples on a colour chip seem less intense than on a large wall. Always ask for an A4 brushout, then buy a test-pot Paint a alarge piece of harboard or card with your test pot, moving it around the room at different times of the day. Then you are ready to buy several litres of paint.

I had trouble matching a carpet in a dark raspberry pink. Each time I painted the soft pink from the colour chip as a test-pot on the wall, I ended-up with a startling strawberry ice-cream colour. I moved down to the chart to a beige with just a touch of pink in, and it was perfect

What caught your eye the first time you walked in the room? If it was something good [the fireplace], find a way to enhance that feature[ make that wall your feature wall] Is the room too cold? Is there an archetetrial detail that needs to be minimised?

 

 

 

This blue wall is a feature of the room, do you like the way the blue draws attention to it

 

 

 

 

 

Or would you rather hide it by blending it with the other walls?

Decide the effect that you want to create.

Do you want the room to be restful or invigorating? What colours will give that effect?

 

 

Blues and greens will look restful, perfect for the bedroom

 

Understand colours.

Understand the psychology of colours, how they make you feel. Learn the categories of colour, warm, cool, light, dark, vivid and dull. Be familiar with hue, lightness, and saturation.

When combining two or more colours there should be an interval between them. If they are of a similar hue, they should be separated by saturation (along the radius of the wheel or by lightness{ along the vertical axis}, or the room will appear bland.

 

 

Choose the main colour first.

Chose the colour of the largest area first, then the next largest area and so on.

Most people have a preference for the warm or the cool side of the colour wheel. Look in your wardrobe and decide which side the majority of your clothes fall under, and let that be your guide. This doesn’t mean that you can’t use colours from the other side, but it does mean that you will feel more comfortable with these colours, and you and your furnishings won’t clash!

Choose the wall and ceiling colour first {probably pale or pastel] Then a darker or more vivid shade for the moulding or the trim.

When choosing the background colours light colours look better than dark colours, warm colours look better than cool colours, [ in cold climates and vice versa] .

Choose the shades before the hues

Most people start by choosing a colour, but have spend a little time in thinking about the shades .By designing the room in shades of grey, you can focus on the effect you want to achieve- the big picture.

Lightness and contrast are more important, choosing the shade first decides the overall effect, light and pastel, dark and subdued etc. Start with the background (usually light or dull shade) then your accent colours (dark or vivid) then find the hues that match the shade.

Vary the shades

It is more important to vary the shades than to vary the hues. Contrasting light with dark colours the scheme will look bold and 3 dimensional. Contrasting the hues the scheme may look flat and lifeless. You whole room could be in blue, and still look exciting. The walls light blue with one dark feature wall; a mid -blue carpet; skirting boards a dark blue that is almost black This will give all the depth that you need.

Use compatible hues

When varying the shades, common ground is needed between the colours, hues that are similar or compatible. Colour combinations in varying shades and hues give too much contrast.

Keep colours in harmony by using similar hues, or different shades of the same hue, contrasting or complimentary hues may be used if there is not too much contrast and shade.

Warm colours will overpower cold ones in the same colour scheme.

To make hues more compatible mix a little of the first hue with a little of the second hue, and a little of the second hue with the first hue e.g. red violet and blue violet are better together than red and blue.

 

Limit the number of colours

Two or three colours is usually enough, four with care, five is usually too many.

There should only be one dominant colour, which sets the tone for the whole scheme, the other colours should be subordanant in either hue, lightness, or saturation.

 

Use vivid colours sparingly

Use a vivid colour as an accent colour, if another accent colour is needed use a darker shade of the vivid colour. They look good with neutral or achromatic shades.

 

Use achromatic colours for harmony

The common mistake is using too many strong colours. White black or grey will not clash as most colours go with them, they look exciting with a vivid or restful with a pastel.

Use familiar colours

Unusual colours like magenta, bright lime,or purple may look jarring. They can look wonderful, but need to be chosen with more care.

Use natural colours

Many of the colours in nature are harmonious –sand yellow and sky blue; rose pink with leaf green. We are used to seeing them together and thinking how good they look, try copying some of the combinations you have seen.

 

Be original

Choose something different, be daring. The worst that can go wrong is that you have to buy another tin of paint and re-paint a wall. Curtains or a settee that were the wrong choice is a much more expensive mistake to rectify!

Know the rules, then break them!

 

Guidelines for using Colour

 

Nature conditions us to expect balance and harmony and offers us guide-lines for the use of colour.

 

The darkest value at our feet		e.g. forest floor
The medium level at eye level		e.g. tree trunks
The lightest value above us		e.g. sky

 

This is only a guideline. Personally I prefer a light to mid-range colour on the floor, this makes the room look larger, pale colour on three walls, a darker feature wall, a very dark [or bright] skirting board/architrave.

 

Use the most intense hues and values in areas occupied for short periods of time such as hallways, laundries, entrances, etc. In these areas you can use bright orange, lime green or shocking pink, as you are only exposed to the colour for a few minutes. Use this colour in a lounge and it would drive you crazy

A factory was having trouble with it’s work force going to often and spending too long in the mens toilets A colour consultant suggested they painted the toilets a particularly vile shade of electric green. The employees’ behavior changed so radically that overnight productivity went up 8%!

Avoid monotony and treat the eye and psyche to at least a moderate variety. This can be through different colours, tone, shades or patterns

Mix patterns and plains.

Visual stimulus is important, but a room also needs to be restful, so these two aspects need to be balanced. For example, in a bedroom have the feature wall in an exciting color, but have it on the same wall that the bed is on, so you won’t see it as you settle down to sleep.

Harmonious colour selections are created by a pleasing relationship of the three dimensions of colour, hue, intensity and value. Choosing these is partly intuitive, but can be refined by understanding the theory.

A touch of contrasting colour can be lively and exciting but too much can become uncomfortable.

On the other hand, too much moderation produces a bland and dull room.

Always remember the 80:20 rule, most of the room in a neutral colour,

a small part in an exciting colour. It is often not difficult to start, but sometimes it is harder to know when to stop! Remember the design adage, ‘Less is more’.

Personal taste and preferences are the most important considerations in choosing a colour scheme. This is your home, some of your friends will like it, some will hate it, because you do not have the same tastes. Listen to their criticism, they may have a valid point that you missed, but the final decision is yours.

Ask ten people what colour they would paint that wall, and you will get ten different answers, even from interior designers!

 

Think of colour as a chameleon:

• It changes depending upon accent colours.
• It is influenced by adjacent colours.
• White or beige colours with take on the tint of adjacent hues.
• Large areas intensify the colours.
• The same colour painted on all four walls can look totally different on each wall, due to the light.
• Colours that work together in daylight may clash under artificial light. Always paint boards with test-pots and view them under both conditions.

 

 

Decorating a room is similar to getting dressed, only the proportions differ. You wear black trousers, a white blouse, a bright red belt, black shoes, gold necklace and ear-rings. That’s the same as painting a room white, a red feature wall, black leather settee, gold framed pictures.

You make colour decisions with clothes every-day, and are probably quite good at it. You just need to transfer this knowledge from your wardrobe to your walls!

 

Natural light from sun makes colours rich and vibrant Colour varies at morning noon and evening.

To much light gives glare, small windows do not provide adequate lighting, sometimes it’s necessary to admit a room can’t be made brighter, so go for a dark cosy feel instead, and play-up the feeling of darkness, but never to the point of depression!

 

In the northern hemisphere southern facing rooms receive the ‘purest’ light for most of the day, so the colours are seen as fairly true. In southern facing rooms, you can use almost any colour but remember that direct sunlight will make bright colours look brighter.

Eastern and western facing rooms have changing light. For an eastern window, the morning light is ‘warm’ and changes to a ‘cold’ light as the sun moves around the house. In westerns facing rooms, this is reversed with the ‘cold’ light in the morning and ‘warm’ light in the evening. East and west facing rooms can be more of a problem as the light changes with the time of day. The use of the room can have an effect – if it is used mainly in the morning, decorate an eastern room as for a south facing room or a western room as if it were a north facing room. Reverse this if the room is mainly used in the evening. If the room is used throughout the day, try a mix of warm and cold colours to complement the changing light.

Northern facing rooms tend to have ‘cold’ light all day, the advantage is that it is fairly constant throughout the day. In northern facing rooms, avoid cold colours, use bright and warm colours to counter the effect of the ‘cold’ light.

If you live in the southern hemisphere, reverse all these directions.

Project

Use paint charts to decide the colours [and shades and tones] that appeal to you. Cut them out, and stick them on some card.

Go to your wardrobe and see which colours match your clothes, the ones you wear, not the ones at the back you don’t really like!

Make a decision on whether you are a warm or a cool coloured person. You should find that the colours marry together, you may find some colours you had not thought of wearing, or conversely some colours you hadn’t thought of putting on your wall!

 

 

The designer touch with colour

 

The colours and combinations will be interesting or unusual.

The colours will match or co-ordinate with the furnishings.

There will be contrasts in shades.

There may be feature walls.