Color My Worlds -- Part One

Color.

I am a color junkie.

3 years ago when a painting contractor handed me the giant Benjamin Moore fan deck of hundreds of paint chips and told me I had a day to choose the colors for the rooms here at That Old House . . . it was one of the scariest, and happiest, days of my life.

Looking back, that seems easy.  I was choosing to please myself.
If I goofed, I had only myself to blame, and I'm not that harsh a critic.

Kitchen and dining area, our beach house.

But now we're choosing colors for the family beach house, my sister Peggy and I.  We want beautiful sand, sea and sky colors, we want them neutral enough that if we sell the house we won't need to re-paint, and we want everyone to love them.

Here are our front runners; I'd like to know what you think.
Please note that the colors on your monitor won't be accurate;
they are prettier in person!

For the kitchen, dining area, living room, and the stairs

from the first to the second floor, Benjamin Moore Rich Cream. 

Rich Cream

For the second and third floors, with the high peaked ceiling and huge windows, 

the limitless views over sand and sea. . . 

View from the third floor loft.

Luckily the vaulted ceiling doesn't need painting!

 For the second floor, we will probably use

Benjamin Moore Philadelphia Cream.  It is just slightly more intense, more yellow,

but still neutral.  It will reflect the beautiful light, well, beautifully.

Philadelphia Cream

Rich Cream paint at the bottom; Philadelphia Cream in the middle.   Top color too white; out of the running.

 In the bedrooms, we get more adventurous.

Oh my, that sounds exciting, doesn't it?

Well, we also get adventurous in the bathrooms.  With paint, at any rate.

I like these mild greens; Peggy wants something sprout-i-er.  See below.

Italian Ice

Lido Green

 On second thought, maybe those greens are too minty.

 So for the first floor powder room, a sprout green it is; our Mom had decorated this room with dozens of frogs, and we'd like to put a few of them back.  Green seems to work in this small bath.

Pale Vista -- a light spring green

For the first floor master suite -- bedroom, bathroom, walk in closet -- a clear and cooling blue.  This room has southern exposure, and the afternoon sun heats up the walls something wild; right now they are a dusty pink, and they glow.  We are considering several colors.  Not pink!

Summer Shower

Morning Sky Blue

Baby's Breath -- looks very gray on computer. Less gray in person.

Upstairs, in the hall bath, what else but a dreamy aqua blue?

The color of the water in a deep bathtub at an old spa hotel in Europe.

Maybe one of these two:

Innocence

Crystal Blue -- I like this one a lot.

On the second floor, the former sewing room will be a bedroom with twin beds, and that also has southern exposure -- so another blue room.  I might like to repeat the bathroom color in this room; they are across the hall from one another.  Crystal Blue looks a good bet to me for both rooms.

The corner bedroom, with a double bed and a crib, will be in a sweet yellow.  Light and floaty.

Lemon Ice; very reflective and glowing

Or, we could try what might be Moore's best yellow, a rich creamy color from the Historic collection:

Hawthorne Yellow -- looks very dark on computer, not so in life.

The twin bedroom at the end of the upstairs hall, a north-west exposure -- well, maybe green.  Maybe blue.  Not decided yet, but here are some possibilities:

Glass Slipper

Gossamer Blue

Ocean Air

Sea Foam

Serenata

We are trying to keep our colors gender-neutral.  No sweet pinks or misty lavenders.  We don't want it all the same color, as if a contractor came in and slapped Linen White on it all.  We want blues, greens, off whites and yellows -- with shots of color in the furnishings and accessories.

Sound like a plan?

If you have an inspiration for colors in the Benjamin Moore palettes, please share!  We don't want to get into color matching and would like to stay with the Moore colors, even though there are some fabulous colors from other sources.

We've chosen the painter; now we need to choose the paint.

Happy Thursday to you all.  I hope you will enjoy watching the transformation of our beach house unfold, beginning with the walls and floors, and seeing how much can be done on a shoestring.

We have to bite the bullet and hire painters, what with needing things

like scaffolding and time  in order to do this ourselves.  It's a big house.

Visit Gina at The Shabby Chic Cottage for Transformation Thursday (click here!), and please keep checking back to see our progress!  We've got plans for slipcovers, painted furniture, nautical touches . . . my notebook for the beach house is almost as thick as my notebook for Alida's wedding!

 

Tomorrow:  Color My Worlds -- Part Two.
That Old House Is Getting The Full Beauty Treatment!
Help her choose her palette.  -- Cass