Paint Palettes: My House

One of my favorites things to explore with color are various combinations of colors, creating palettes. Even tan, gray, and other "neutrals" can be exciting when developed within a palette of hues.

One of the best resources for great home decor palettes is Restoration Hardware. They have a whole palette created and even sell paint. I started with some of these colors in my own house to create a basic palette of neutrals. I have slowly built upon those neutrals and added dark tones with chocolate brown and black and my favorite accent of copper. This doesn't mean that everything is this color as I love to mix materials, styles, and color, but this basic foundation gives my house unity and helps give me a calm feeling for everyday life. I think it is important to decorate with things you like and many styles and elements can work well when mixed together. The key is having this underlying theme and my theme is a neutral color palette.

I love the RH silver sage collection and really used this as my starting point. I used this shade in my living room and consider it the main space of my house. From there I moved to my kitchen with sycamore green and my dining room is cappucino and my entry hall and stairway are painted flax. This space connects everything together.

My floors have a cinnamon tone and I used this as the inspiration for my overall accent color. I use this rust/cinnamon/copper color throughout my house for nice pops of color. Most of my furniture is a neutral buff, chocolate or espresso brown, or black. I have an occasional warm wood wood tone or metal finish. I love metals and they way they all seem to work well together and bring a warmth to furnishings with such a hard finish. I have mixed together copper, pewter, rust, black, iron, and many other metals for this interest variation of color throughout these rooms.

Color...what is it?

Color is something that I have always loved even since first learning about Roy G. Biv. This really is the basis of everything that is color. What you see is actually the reflection of light and the visible light spectrum is made up of the 7 colors of the rainbow (ROYGBIV).

R = red
O = orange
Y = yellow
G = green
B = blue
I = indigo
V = violet

The study of color. I'm not a scientific expert on color. I merely enjoy color and my interaction with it visually.

chroma = saturation of a color // color = wavelength composition of light // shade = a gradation of color referring to its degree of darkness // tint = a gradation referring to its degree of lightness // hue = a modification of a basic color

However, this is just the start of color. There are all kinds of interesting areas of research out there involving color theory and color relationships. The way colors work together, appear in different lights and on different materials is what really makes it interesting. I don't love all colors or all color combinations, but I do find all aspects of color interesting.

Tell me about your daily experiences with color. From the basics of CRAYOLA to the PANTONE® MATCHING SYSTEM®, color is a part of daily life for every age.

Look for upcoming posts on various color palettes.