Choosing the right paint color for your home’s interior can sometimes feel like an impossible battle

You have that one friend whose stunning, midnight blue dining room walls look incredible.

Then you have that other friend whose purple bedroom walls have become her biggest home décor regret.

Maybe you love bright, floral colors but you’re worried that you won’t love them anymore once your living room is bright pink; or you love neutral colors but your guests always hint that your décor is too bland.

Forget trying to please other people with your home décor and interior paint – you’re just trying to come up with something you yourself can live with, and even that feels impossible right now.

In the midst of choosing interior paint colors, homeowners often go wrong in a few different ways:

  • They choose their favorite paint color “in a vacuum” without considering other important factors like lighting, room size, mood, and the other colors in their home
  • They feel pressured to take a “go big or go home” approach and undertake huge a multi-room painting project even though they aren’t really sold on the colors they chose
  • They assume that their own color psychology is the same as everyone else’s – but cool and calming blue to one person might seem cold and clinical to another
  • They think choosing paint color should be a leap of faith (“here we goooo!”) instead of a confident, educated decision

Choosing interior paint color doesn’t have to be so risky

Yes, choosing your interior paint color can be really stressful, but it doesn’t have to be as difficult and regret-filled as it ends up becoming for many homeowners. There are a few principles you can follow when choosing paint color that will help you minimize regret and maximize your happiness at home.

Here are 7 surprising tips for choosing interior paint colors:

Start small

Think you’ve found a color you’ll like but worried it’s a little too bold or risky? Don’t start with the big dining room accent wall. Paint something small like the powder room or the guest bedroom and see if you actually like it in the real world first. You can go big once you’ve confirmed it really is the right color for your home.

Choose a color already in your home

Stumped by the thousands of paint colors to choose from? Instead of choosing at random, start by looking for colors you love in your own home. Maybe it’s the blue accents in a painting on your wall or an accent pillow or centerpiece you’ve always loved. Start with something you already know you love in your home.

Make use of monochromatic color schemes to add variety

If you want the depth and interesting feel of having multiple colors in one room, but you’re worried about going too crazy with different colors, you can achieve that look more safely by going with a monochromatic color scheme or light, complementary colors. Varying shades of light blue or a mix of blue and green would be perfect.

Choose colors based on architecture

Go beyond just picking basic colors for your walls. Instead, choose colors based on the architectural features that make your home unique. For example, paint all the molding and built-in’s one color throughout the house to create continuity. Or paint high ceilings warm colors for a cozy feel, or low ceilings cool, light colors for a more open feel. Similarly, to make a too-big room feel smaller, use warm colors on the walls; to make a too cramped room feel bigger and airier, use cool colors on the walls instead.

Use bold colors wisely

If you are burning to incorporate your favorite bold colors but worried you will end up regretting it, try a safer route: use bold colors as accents only, not as the dominant color in a room.

Start with the most important room

If you have one room that is bigger and more central than the others (such as the kitchen) or one room you already plan to paint more boldly than the others, pick paint for that room first. Then let the colors for the other rooms be complementary and subtler, while letting that one room take center stage set the tone for the house.

Pick paint color last, not first

This is probably the most important – and surprising – tip. Homeowners often choose paint colors first, when moving in, but it’s actually much easier to choose paint colors last. That’s true for a very simple reason: you can choose paint to match any accent color found in a rug, lamp, art, or piece of furniture, but the reverse isn’t true. So choose the other home décor items with colors you love, and then pick the wall paint color to match those accents.

Are you thinking about tackling an interior paint project in the greater Seattle area? I would love to help. Get in touch with me to get a bid and find out more about what I can do for you.