Here are 7 professional advices for picking interior paint colors that give your house a rich individuality.

How To Use Interior Paint Colors

1. Make Small Spaces Feel Bigger or Cozier

What Colors Make A Room Look Bigger?

Warm colors foster intimacy, whereas cool colors tend to make a space feel broader and more open. Large rooms can typically take more color than small areas, at the most basic level. Darker colors create the illusion that surfaces are closer together than they actually are, while lighter colors can expand a tiny space, according to Debbie Zimmer.

What Colors Make A Room Cozier?

Of fact, not all compact areas must appear large: For example, hunter green or rust may work better for you than pale peach or celery if you want to create a cozy or friendly ambiance in a foyer, study, or library.

2. Using Color Architecturally

Playing up the architectural characteristics of a room is one of the best ways to utilize color to change it. Colored walls can benefit from additional layers of interest provided by molding, mantels, built-in bookcases, arched doorways, wainscot, windows, and doors, among other architectural features.

Painting Molding and Doorways

Sheri Thompson, director of color marketing and design at Sherwin-Williams, advises painting moulding or doors a shade or two brighter or darker than the main wall to add subtle focus. The slight color change, she claims, “really draws your eye to the detail.”

Another technique to capture attention is to paint a metallic glaze directly over an already painted object, like a ceiling medallion. “A copper or bronze finish is very translucent and gives a nice shimmer that enhances the architectural feature,” explains Thompson.

Where Do You Switch Color When Moving From Door to Casing?

Although it’s not a black-and-white situation, the general rule is to paint the sides of the door the same color as the trim in the room it swings into and the face of the door the color of the trim in the room it faces when shut.

If you use various trim colours in adjacent rooms, they must complement one another nicely. Doors frequently remain open, so you frequently see the trim colour of an adjacent room in any given space, notes painter Susan English. Let’s imagine that a barn-red entrance leads into a space with light yellow walls. If used judiciously, this can be a useful accent colour in the area where it “doesn’t belong.”

Maintaining a constant trim color in adjacent rooms with open entryways often creates a sense of cohesion and creates an attractive, uninterrupted line. Even where the wall colors are different in an open layout, think about painting all the trim white.

3. Exploring Using Two Different Colors in The Same Room

Use two different colours in the same space for a more daring look. Consider painting a built-in bookcase or niche in a room with blue walls a shade of green to draw attention to the objects displayed there or in the niche. Of course, if architectural features are painted the same color throughout the entire house, they can also create a sense of continuity. White and off-white have historically been the color of choice for molding, windows, and doors dating back to the Federal era.

4. Create Contrast in Rooms with Wainscoting

An excellent chance for a contrast between light and dark is found in a room with wainscot. A white wainscot next to a colored wall will bring the eye to the wainscot, whereas a dark wainscot below a bright wall will draw attention to the upper walls. You can also use paint to simulate wainscot where none actually exists by painting the upper third of the wall one color and the bottom third another. To further accentuate the wainscot impression, lay a piece of flat molding along the intersection and paint it the color of the lower wall.

5. Create An Accent Wall to Add a Focal Point

Painting a “accent wall” in a vibrant colour where the others are white or neutral can provide a dramatic, modern edge to spaces that are otherwise very featureless. Alternately, you may paint the main walls a gentle colour like beige or celadon green and the accent wall three tones deeper, as suggested by New York colour marketing consultant Ken Charbonneau. The accent wall still adds some impact to the space, but it’s not as strong.

6. Explore Bolder Options with Multiple Colors

Doty Horn, director of colour and design for Benjamin Moore, advises rethinking the idea of painting a wall from corner to corner if drama is your goal. By doing this, you’ll add an architectural focus where one isn’t already present. Try painting a third of one wall and two thirds of the neighbouring wall, encircling the corner with colour, as you work your way clockwise around the space. Then, to cover that corner, paint the final eighth of the second wall and the remaining three-quarters of its neighbouring wall.

Another daring move would be to paint a large wall almost to the Centre, moving in from both corners, leaving an 18 to 20-inch vertical line of white space, and hang art down the middle.

7. Treat Your Ceiling Like a Fifth Wall

Paint any crown molding the same color as the wall and paint low ceilings white to make them appear higher. This will prevent your upward look from being broken.

Although painting the ceiling a lighter shade of the wall colour might have a similar effect, keeping to “ceiling white” often makes a space feel airy. Simply choose the paint sample card on which your wall colour is the middle option, and then choose a ceiling colour that is one or two shades lighter. As a result of the lessened contrast between the colour of the walls and ceiling, the space will appear larger. Even painting the ceiling the same colour as the walls will enlarge a small space, like a bathroom.

Of course, sometimes visually lowering the ceiling gives off a cosy sense of containment. Ken Charbonneau painted the dining room ceiling Pompeiian Red in his own 19th-century brownstone. “People frequently inquire about whether the red paint doesn’t make the ceiling too low. However, since you’ll be seated the entire time you’re in the dining room and want to create a warm, cosy, and personal atmosphere, why not? Of course, his 11-foot ceilings are high. Painting a bedroom ceiling a light robin’s egg blue, for example, might be a method to get a comparable, calming effect in a home with ceilings that are only 8 or 9 feet high.

Just remember what Orange Park Acres, California-based color expert Kathleen Jewell discovered: “Warm shades lose their yellow tones on a surface where no sun ever falls, turning bluer and grayer,” or dingy.

5 Paint Color Selection Mistakes To Avoid

1. Being Afraid To Explore Interior Paint Color Options

According to New York-based colour marketing strategist Ken Charbonneau, the world is split into two groups: those who use colour bravely and those who use colour fearfully. People who reside in vibrant environments have overcome their anxiety of making a mistake. Always begin with a colour you adore, whether it be from a rug, a painting, or a fabric, as that is the best approach to overcome that phobia. Next, test it against a wall. Consider asking your paint retailer to create it at “half-strength” to lighten it if it’s too dark, or to tone it down by adding more grey if it’s too bright.

2. Putting Too Much Paint On The Walls

Be cognizant of a room’s colour saturation. “Don’t paint the walls with equally vibrant colours if you have an Oriental rug with five or six bright colours. Sheri Thompson of Sherwin-Williams advises making the rug the centre of attention and painting the walls a softer colour.

3. Putting Too Little Paint On The Walls

Consider your space in terms of the 60-30-10 formula used by designers if you feel it is uninteresting.

What is the 60 30 10 decorating rule?

Typically, the walls make up 60% of the colour in a room, followed by the upholstery, floor covering, or window treatments for 30%, and accent items, accessories, and artwork for 10%. Put some colour on those white walls.

4. Rushing The Paint Selection Process

Painting a 4-by-4-foot swatch on the wall and residing with it for at least 24 to 48 hours so you can see how it looks in use is the best method to pick a color you can live with.

A given color’s perception can be influenced by factors including the size of the room, the amount of natural or artificial light, and competing components like flooring and furnishings.

Finding a color you’ll love living with for years is worth the extra time to complete the swatch test, according to Doty Horn of Benjamin Moore.

Many paint manufacturers offer little jars of paint for testing: Use one to apply your preferred paint to a large piece of foam-core board. Place it in various locations throughout the space and, over the course of a few days, see how it reflects the upholstery and responds to the type and quantity of light there.

5. Forgetting About Primer

Primer, whether white or coloured, is essential to achieving the exact colour you chose when painting a wall. At The Home Depot, paint sales assistant Michael Baillie adds, “Priming ensures there will be no interference from the previous wall color.”