When Jennifer Brown painted her Bucktown townhouse, she was daring with the powder room. She covered the walls with red paint and a gold leaf border. Combined with faucets that had the French words for hot and cold and a doorknob from a Paris hotel, she calls the lavatory the “French brothel theme.”
Brown sought a “’20s Paris feel” for the room, which is small and out of the way, a safe place to try bold colors. “In a big room, you’ve got to be careful because the color overwhelms the room,” she advises. “In a small room that you use on an infrequent basis, you can go really funky.”
In his 1851 work, “The Stones of Venice,” John Ruskin said, “The purest and most thoughtful minds are those which love color the most.”
Yet many people go for shades of white and beige in their homes, in part because it can be overwhelming to choose from hundreds of colors.
Every day, people paint the rooms of their home. Some use color to liven up a subtle atmosphere, while others paint as a design element, a starting place for the room’s personality. The process of painting can be daunting, but anybody can do it. Design professionals tell people to go slow and start small.
Before you embark on a painting project, create a “wish book,” recommends Nicole Montgomery of Chameleon Concepts in Chicago’s Roscoe Village. Tear pages out of design magazines. Look for a feeling, not specific colors.
In their book, “Color,” Meryl Lloyd and Joanna Copestick suggest taking it a step further–put pieces of fabric, leaves or flowers and paint samples in there, too. Know “what you respond to intuitively,” they say. “Gathering images that inspire you is the best way of sparking ideas.”
Once you have your ideas down, it’s easier to select the color, which is the hardest part of painting. The “mental aggravation” of choosing color is what “causes people to get depressed and worn out,” not the actual act of painting, says Joshua Goldmeier, store manager at Hi-Grade/Sappanos Decorating Center on North Halsted Street in Chicago.Goldmeier leads people all the way through, beginning with the “wall of color, a collection of all the paint companies’ color chips under special lights that don’t distort. We tell people to pick something in the room that they want to bring out–a piece of fabric in a couch, chair or rug, accent pieces or antiques.”
A lot depends on personality–only certain people can live among vibrant colors. “A number of people are scared to death of putting a deep red in a dining room even though it’s a very beautiful color and good for your appetite,” he says.
Nowadays, folks are choosing warmer, bolder colors more than they did a decade ago, when neutrals were all the rage. It’s about evoking an Old World, homey feeling, according to Rick Glickman, of Dream Kitchens Inc. in Skokie.
“[People are painting kitchens] biscuit, cream and beiges, warmer colors as opposed to the stark whites. People are doing melon yellow or squash yellow as an accent,” he says.
Today’s popular colors are no coincidence. The international Color Marketing Group decides as much as three years in advance what colors are going to be “in.” They base their choices on world trends including ecology, politics and music.
“If we’re at war, no one is going to want army green in the house as a reminder,” explains Sandra Luttchens, a Color Marketing Group member and director of design and training for Omega Cabinetry in Waterloo, Iowa.
Blue is hot now because everyone’s concerned with ecology and water, she says. “Some of the blues are getting lighter for that spa-like atmosphere,” she explains. “Everybody is so stressed out, we want to calm them down again.”
Orange, spicy red and yellow ochre are also trendy thanks to the Latin American influence on music.
According to color psychologists, cool colors like violet, blue and green can actually lower your blood pressure, heart rate and body temperature, whereas warm colors such as red, orange and yellow do the opposite. Yellow is the most pleasing color, so it’s good for an entryway, to make people feel comfortable when they visit, says Sherrie Border, a designer with Chicago-based A Faux Affair.
“For a long time, we were so safe, [thinking] you have to paint neutral for resale,” says Luttchens. “People are starting to make more money now, and it’s like, `Hey this is my space, I want to feel comfortable here; the next person can come in and paint.’ It’s their sanctuary, and it needs to feel good.”
Some people are even going out on a limb. Stephanie Pfeffer hired a professional to create faux finishes on the walls of her Printers Row loft.
“I knew I wanted to do something fun,” says Pfeffer, whose concrete abode has brick walls and 14-foot ceilings. “I have this huge wall separating the kitchen and living room. On the corner, it’s glass block. I wanted to do something wild because eventually I [planned] to tear it down. Now I feel differently because I love it so much.”
She hired Montgomery to paint 2-foot-square blocks of color on that wall, using three shades of blue, light green and purple. Then she painted the entryway wall rose with 1-foot vertical stripes in a metallic finish.
Pfeffer did some of the painting herself as well, including turning her bedroom lavender.
“Tape everything,” she advises. “I always thought you could just be careful; I recommend [using] drop cloths. Pull the tape off when the paint’s wet because if it dries on the tape at all, it pulls the paint off.”
Don’t be afraid of color, advises Montgomery. “Everybody wants beige and sage. They’re safe, the whites of the ’90s and 2000s, but there are so many things you can do to enhance a room.”
Consider the possibility of an accent wall, one wall painted a brighter or bolder color than the other three. Use extra thick and shiny porch paint indoors to create a wet effect. And if you’re nervous about bold color, just paint the moldings.
The paint must coordinate with the furniture and purpose. In the end, though, it doesn’t matter if a color looks horrid. “It’s just paint,” says Goldmeier. “You can paint over it.”
What you need to know
– Buy test colors. Paint a 4-by-4 foot square on the wall and leave it there for two days, to see it in all available light.
– Figure you can paint 350 square feet per gallon for a light color, 300 for a dark color.
– You don’t always need a primer. Walls in good condition just need to be washed first. If you’re switching from an oil-based finish to water-based, consider priming it.
– There are two types of paint: latex water-based and oil-based alkyd.
– High-end paints are all 100 percent acrylic, which allows for better coverage and durability.
– Sheen levels include flat, eggshell (matte), satin or pearl, semigloss and high-gloss.
– If you have kids, pets or frequent parties, an eggshell finish is the most washable.
– Semigloss or satin are better for bathrooms and kitchens.
– Bathroom and kitchen paints, known as KTB, contain extra mildewcide, which helps retard mildew from forming on the paint. It only comes in light colors or white.
– Remember that color will always deepen a shade or two on the wall.
— Lynne Meredith Schreiber
