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We have prepared this homeowner’s guide as a resource to help you select the
perfect paint colors for the rooms in your home. It begins with tips on how to go
about selecting room colors. We then introduce several online tools from major
paint manufacturers – Benjamin Moore, Sherwin-Williams, PPG Pittsburgh
Paints – and walk you through how to use those tools to select the right colors
for your rooms. We also have a section that shows you how to test paint before
making a decision to buy and apply it.
If the latest design trends in interior colors serve as inspiration to you, we’ve
included a chapter on the paint manufacturers’ 2014 Colors of the Year and a
chapter on our choices for the Hottest Interior Colors for 2014.
We hope you will find this information helpful. We would welcome your questions
and comments.
Sincerely,
Brian Ciota
Vice President & Co-Owner
One of the keys to using color in a home setting is to coordinate the hues of
various rooms. Think of your home as a color palette when making color choices.
We find that people are often afraid of experimenting with color and are unsure of
what tones will be pleasing in their homes. Here are a few tips to help you
select room colors:
Consider colors that appeal to you. What colors are most frequently in
your wardrobe? If you’ve visited homes or have photos of rooms that
serve as an inspiration for your project, what colors caught your eye?
Look at your furnishings for keys to wall color. If you have upholstered
pieces, what are the dominant colors? Would you use a similar or
complementary color on the walls?
Use the “Color Wheel.” Remember your art classes in elementary school
when the art teacher pulled out a color wheel? Those principles are helpful
in selecting wall colors, trims and accents for a room in your home.
Benjamin Moore’s “Color Language” guide has a very helpful section on
how to use the Color Wheel to select interior paint colors and
combinations.
Paint manufacturers have come a long way in creating tools to help consumers
select the right room colors. Now, we’re taking it one step further by bringing you
the best-of-the-best of what the manufacturers have to offer online. Just one
word of caution – it is best to use these tools with a high resolution computer
monitor that is capable of showing colors most true to the manufacturer’s paint
colors.
Benjamin Moore
Color Gallery
The Color Gallery contains more than 3,000 paint colors and 28 options for
narrowing your choices. The options are organized in three groups:
Color Families.
Select from warm
colors (yellows,
oranges, reds), cool
colors (pinks,
purples, blues,
greens) or neutral
colors (browns,
neutrals, whites,
grays, blacks).
Color Collections.
Here you can select
paint colors
featured in eight
Benjamin Moore
Color Collections,
including: Color
Preview, Affinity, Off-White Colors, Designer Classics, Historical Colors,
Classic Colors, America’s Colors and Color Stories.
Trends and Favorites. This grouping also offers eight options, including
Best Sellers, Most Viewed, Colors for Vinyl Siding, Young House Love
Colors, WILLIAMSBURG Color Collection, Color Trends 2014, Candice
Olson Colors and The Color of What Matters.
What we like most about Color Gallery is that you can narrow your choices by
selecting individual options within each group. For example, if you choose ‘Blue’
in “Color Families”, “Historical Colors” in Color Collections and “Best Sellers” in
Trends and Favorites it will give you three paint color choices.
Another great feature of this tool is revealed after you identify a paint color. Just
click on the color and it takes you to a webpage just for that paint color where
you can see:
This interactive tool lets you see how any Benjamin Moore paint color will look in
a room. Here’s what you can do with the Personal Color Viewer:
The gallery offers photos of five to eight interior room design options in
these categories: bathrooms, bedrooms, dining rooms, entryways, home
offices, kid’s rooms, kitchens and living rooms. We really love this
feature!
Upload a photo of your room and give it a name and description. You
are then asked to identify the different surface areas in the room you will
be painting. Walls, trim and ceiling are surfaces.
For each surface, you will use several tools to define the surface area. If
you have used photo editing tools such as magic brushes and wands, you
will be familiar with how this works.
If you haven’t used these features before, you may find it difficult to define
the surface areas, especially trims or where objects such as dressers or
wall decorations cover part of the surface area. The tool does try to block
out unintended objects but it doesn’t always do it successfully.
You’ve probably seen Benjamin Moore’s popular paint color brochures at dealer
stores. Now, you can also view and download them online. These brochures
provide many creative ideas and suggestions about color combinations for every
room. Their current interior paint brochures available online include:
Historical Collection
With this app for iPhone and iPad you can capture
any part of a photo and find its match from Benjamin
Moore’s 3,300 paint colors.
Sherwin-Williams
Paint Color Visualizer
Sherwin-Williams has a great website that allows you to experiment with their
colors before you invest in paint. Here’s what you can do with their interactive
Paint Color Visualizer:
Select photos of
rooms that
represent your
space and drag
and drop palette
colors to identify
the shades that
are ideal for your
home.
Upload a photo of your room and then use the drag and drop palette
color tool. We found that the drag and drop feature does try to block out
items that are not part of the walls such as sinks and furniture but it
doesn’t always do it successfully. You may find some frustration with this
feature.
PPG Pittsburgh Paints has an interactive palette to help you visualize how their
paint colors will look in a room. Here’s what PPG’s Paint Color Visualizer offers:
Select a photo
from their gallery
that represents
your room. They
offer seven
galleries –
bathrooms,
bedrooms, dining
rooms, foyers,
kitchens, living
rooms and
sunroom. Each
gallery has two to
six stock photos.
After selecting a
photo you’ll need
to select the
colors you want to consider for your project. There are four options for
selecting colors:
Once you’ve selected the paint colors you want to try you can drag and
drop colors onto surfaces including walls, ceilings and trim.
Upload a photo of your room and then use the tool to identify surface
areas (i.e., walls, trims, ceilings) and areas not to be painted. There is
a zoom feature and a straight line drawing tool to help you outline each
surface.
Once you are done with this step, you select paint colors in the same way
as noted above. Then paint colors can be dragged and dropped on each
surface. The tool will try to block out items that are not part of the surface
such as sinks and furniture but it doesn’t always do it successfully. We
found this feature difficult to use.
When choosing a color for a room in your home, keep in mind that colors will
change with lighting. Purchase a paint sample and try it out on a wood board
rather than a wall. If you don’t have a piece of wood, paint a heavy piece of
cardboard or white foam board. Give your board at least two coats to get the true
color. Move it around the room and view it in daylight and at night.
Many major paint manufacturers select a “Color of the Year.” Each offers a color
that differs from competitor choices. Here are some 2014 Colors of the Year:
Paint manufacturers offer products that coincide with interior design trends.
Benjamin Moore is featuring a “Neutral Palette for 2014” of 23 colors, five are
blue. Sherwin Williams has entered into an agreement with Pottery Barn to
create “Pottery Barn Colors for 2014.” The palette of 20 colors complements
Pottery Barn furniture and fabrics. There are many mid-tone colors selected to
enhance the white, black and dark wood furniture finishes.
This year “hot” is “cool” when it comes to interior room colors. Designers are
selecting from subdued palettes. We will be seeing gray, beige, blue, teal and
white wall and trim colors in homes.
When selecting colors for our annual list of the “Hottest Interior Room Colors” we
look at the best selling colors from major manufacturers for tried-and-true paint
colors that will stand the test of time. We also review trends on popular home
décor websites and in magazines. Then, we consider how these colors may
actually look in homes with products our customers here in Central New York
choose for their remodeling projects.
Whites
We are seeing white used as wall color and as trim to complement beige, grays
and blues.
Beige works well in rooms with blue, teal, purple, earth-tones, red, gray, green
and black furnishings and accents. Since beige is a neutral, it makes colors in a
room ‘pop’.
Designers are using neutrals paints that mix gray with beige and refer to these
colors as “greige”. We’ve picked three shades of greige for 2014.
You will most likely be seeing a lot of gray in home interiors this year. At the 2013
CNY Parade of Homes, gray was used by many of the designers. It complements
today’s marble, quartz, granite, soapstone and laminate countertops as well as
stainless steel appliances. It also complements many colors such as yellow, red,
black, navy, orange, violet and teal.
Blues
Two shades of blue that you will be seeing everywhere this year are teal and
indigo.