I thought I had found a good candidate in Behr's Distance, but I don't know. In person it's almost right, but in photos it's not right at all. Interestingly, the lovely folks over at Yellow Brick Home painted their office this color and it looks totally different in their room than it does here. I definitely think this is a paint color that's affected by lighting sources. Since this room gets very little light, I wonder if that's why it's not doing it for me right now.
In this picture it's reading a bit too powdery, whereas in person it looks more steely blue. But against the light blue of the kitchen (also a mistake with paint), it's definitely pulling a bit too ... meh ... for my tastes. Maybe because it's surrounded by all that green? Perhaps a larger swatch could change my impression? In person it really mimics the color of the yarn in this blanket I crocheted in college.
And whereas I've always thought this was a steel blue, it looks too pastel. Am I crazy?
Another element of this room makeover that I want to incorporate is new art. We've had pictures from our trips to Paris and Italy in those frames since 2008. I'm ready for something new. I was thinking I'd love a gallery wall of sailboat prints because I'm really drawn to the silhouettes of them, but I'm not seeing anything I love on etsy. They're all too juvenile or colorful. I thought maybe I'd try to do a couple of sailboat paintings but who am I kidding? My skills aren't that refined.
Then I realized that throughout the years I've taken a handful of sailboat photos so I thought I might play around with them in Photoshop to see if there was something I could do that would be to my liking. While this isn't a sailboat, it is a boat on the water and obviously an image I'm incredibly drawn to (hence the blog banner). And I love what playing around with filters accomplished. Maybe I'll find six or so other photos and print them out on watercolor paper?
At least from pictures, I agree with you. Too pastel, too powdery*. Don't be afraid to go darker.
ReplyDeleteI read somewhere that you should paint rooms that don't get much light in dark, rich colors. If try to 'lighten them up' with paler colors, they just end up looking dingy and tired because you don't have enough light to make the colors shine, so you notice all the shadows instead.
If it were my room, I would bite the bullet and go for a really dark navy. Most of your inspiration pictures look much darker than this sample, and I think with that trim you have it will look really rich and opulent.
(actually, I painted my room dark green, it was scary at first, but I love it)
*Lesson I learned on my room, you need to get greyer as you get darker, or it's overwhelming. So once you get dark enough, it may not be too powdery anymore)
Good points about needing to go with a much richer, darker navy. I went with the third tier on the color swatch because I was afraid the darkest colors would be too much. But this is clearly not enough. Alan reports that he wants more of a gray undertone as well so that it's clearly delineated from the peacock blue in our bedroom.
ReplyDeleteI love our Sheffield Gray from Olympic. It's dark and not powdery in satin finish! I love it!!! Don't be afraid to get more samples. We usually try out 3-4 with most of them not working out, haha!
ReplyDeleteWe usually tape up the little paint squares and leave them for months before making a decision but two of them really looked like they could work. The first was Distance (posted above) and another one ended up being nearly identical to our bedroom so that really wasn't going to work. I really wish Martha Stewart had good dark blues this season but she doesn't. I may have to cough up the cash for Benjamin Moore.
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