I’m considering using blue in a kitchen/dining room area.  This painting by Van Gogh has some great color combinations to use with blues… pale greens, oranges, yellows and a bit of rust and deep red.  They’re all very dynamic together!

The oranges, rusts and browns in the painting above can already be found  in my room in the hardwood floors.  The other colors can be added in elsewhere if I want to follow this color scheme.

Always consider your color scheme in relation to what’s already in the room like the floors, cabinets and the furniture you’ll be keeping.  Area rugs can be used in another room if they don’t fit your scheme.

Check out Color Inspiration from the Masters of Painting to see palettes from some other famous paintings.

The question is, which two colors will go well together? Looking at photos can help plan… so off I went in search of photos of two colored rooms. Type into Google exactly that: “Images Two Colored Rooms”. Not all of the photos that come up in the search are of rooms, but most are and they can give you a starting point for ideas.

My painter had another suggestion. He said to go to a wallpaper store and look in the wallpaper books. They often show different color combinations that work well together. It’s another place to get ideas.

Good luck in your color search!

Lisa

2. Consider the lighting in the room throughout the day and year. You can put samples of paint on the wall (smoothly leaving no lines to show through later). Or paint a board (like a poster board) that you can move around the room to see how it looks throughout the day in the different lighting of the room.

You can easily see lots of photos of rooms in specific colors online! This can help you choose paint colors.

Say you want to see yellow rooms, simply type into Google, “images yellow rooms” (or “red rooms”, “green rooms”, “orange rooms” or “blue rooms”, etc.).  When the search comes up you’ll see “images yellow rooms”.  Click the link to get pages and pages of photos of yellow rooms.  Then click on the thumbnail of any of the photos you’d like to see.

Of course you can do this with any color.

Good luck in your color search!

Lisa

Sherwin-Williams Color Visualizer – Has many colors to see on the walls of different rooms in a house

Pottery Barn’s Experience Colors – Allows you to see the Benjamin Moore PB Colors on the Walls in Specific Rooms

Ralph Lauren Paint Your Own – Lets you see their paint in specific rooms

Benjamin Moore Paint – Lets you see walls with different paint colors and create your own scheme

Glidden’s Color Palette – Lets you put different colors on a wall on the screen

Behr Paint- Behr’s paint picker tools.

Even if you prefer one paint brand over another, you can still try these different tools.  I found Sherwin-Williams’ tool to be very helpful, yet our painter prefers to use Benjamin Moore.

One tip by my painter is to always consider the floor color and cabinets if it’s a kitchen or bathroom.  Those are the items that won’t change.  So don’t see the walls on their own when considering the color.  See the walls in the context of the items that will remain in the room.  We have wood floors and cabinets, so that will have a big affect on making the colors we choose work.

Happy hue hunting!

-Lisa