We’re thinking of moving away from the soft, subtle, and beachy whole-house color scheme that we have going on here and towards something more moody, risky, and sophisticated at the new house. Here’s hoping it works for us (you never know… and we’re the first to admit that sometimes we end up repainting). We’re definitely no strangers to covering our mistakes with another coat or two of something new if we don’t like how things look when we step back and check things out (after sharing the “outtake” pics with you guys of course). So it might take us a few tries to settle on a scheme we love, but right now we’re considering something along these lines:
We haven’t pulled any swatches yet (but we’ll be sure to share actual paint colors when we get there), but right now we’re loving eggplant, soft lavender-pink, slate blue, light gray, avocado green, saturated teal, muddy blue-gray, navy, emerald, artichoke green, chocolate brown, and light khaki. Not all on the walls of course, but also in the curtains, rugs, painted and upholstered furnishings, art, and accessories. Although we’re definitely planning to add pops of different accent colors in a much wider range of tones- these are just the bigger hues that we plan to use more liberally throughout the house for something that’s hopefully cohesive but not too repetitive.
We’re thinking that the overall effect of the colors/decor in our new house will still be semi airy & natural (it’s what we love, what can we say?), but we hope that adding more contrast, more saturated hues, and even more layers of texture (by working in some new furnishings, a few new rugs, more colorful art, and new fabrics galore) will give it a bit more zing than our current soft and subtle vibe. We’re also envisioning a switch from our beloved breezy white curtain panels to printed and saturated floor length drapes in every room of the new house along with a plush upholstered headboard in the master and even some wallpaper going on in a few places. And we’re thinking that a darker sectional would be a fun departure from the light slipcovered sofas you’re used to seeing in our spaces (we’ll craigslist them to get some moolah to put towards the new sectional, since it has pretty much been my life goal to have a big enough living room for a sectional where all of our family can gather).
We’re even thinking about repainting some of our white pedestal tables and our double desk with something smokier and more dramatic. To see a few mood boards we’ve envisioned for the new house, click here and here. Although we’re already thinking about a different bed possibility (we’d like to build one along with a DIY headboard). Who knows where we’ll end up.
What color schemes are floating around your heads these days? Anyone else feeling a shift from light tans and mochas to soft grays and even artichoke, slate blue, and deeper gray-green tones? Anyone going the opposite way and segueing into more breezy and light hues as opposed to the smokier and more high contrast ones that we’ve mentioned? Let’s talk about color. Is there really anything else in the world that’s more fun to discuss? Not to me. Except for my baby girl. I can bore you to tears with stories about her but I’ll save that for my weekly phone call with my mom…
Wow, that is certainly different. Can’t wait to see it!
I wish you would move in already…I want to see projects! It just hasnt been as exciting to follow lately…;( SO HURRY INTO THAT HOUSE!
Our house on the more natural side, so far with tans, lights grays, a mediterrian blue and a olive green. But right now I am loving the slate blue and dark charcoal gray.
I think this is a great idea! I have used BM Hale Navy and Ralph Lauren Reflecting Pool (a very deep teal) in my home, and can say that both of these colors make me deliriously happy. Can’t wait to see the new place in person, let the painting begin!
I am in love with grey tones lately. Our great room has very high ceilings and we painted the walls “Thunder Grey”, a blue-green-grey. I think it’s from Lowe’s Seaside Retreat (Cottage?) collection and it’s a great color and changes subtly throughout the day with the light.
My house is painted entirely (except the kids bedrooms and guest room) in Amherst Gray…a creamy but deep gray. I LOVE the dark color especially as it changes in light. I use different colors to pop…lime green, purples, etc, and lots of natural woods/white furniture and woodwork. I was hesitant at first to do so dark (my first house had the “beachy” pale tones) but I love the drama of the darker richer color and what I can do with it. Oh and it looks awesome with pops of red around the holidays
We had an entire house of tan, light yellow and white and after looking at it!! Our couches, carpet and walls were all varying layers of those colors and it just looked a lot more washed out that I thought when I put it together.
We just redid our bedroom, the guest room/office and nursery (we’re adopting this winter!) over the last year in cooler colors with pops of black, white and saturated colors as accents – red in our bedroom and the nursery, blue in the guest room.
And we’re about to overhaul the living room with an addition and when we do the khaki walls will be repainted in a light blue or grey and there will be COLOR – bright, rich color – everywhere in accessories, pictures, pillows etc. I am so over the “blah”!
I love this blog!
Sherry, what’s the trim situation in the new house? Old wood, I’m assuming? Are you going to paint it or restore it?
Hey Annie,
There is some white trim and some dark wood trim, paneling, and beams. We’re definitely planning to paint it (we like what we like) but we might not always paint it white. Time will tell…
xo,
s
Love it!! Go for the change! :)
yay for color! i would love to see y’alls next house have a lot more color!! I feel that for us people, it’s hard to keep a house looking that perfect. color on the walls would definitely make it look like a home :)
Love the mood board with the gray sectional and greens. Perfect.
oooh the dark colors scare me, but I’m sure whatever you guys do will end up fabulous. I hope you lean towards the grays and punch it up with some bright colors. Maybe that will be more risque than painting your walls plum! Cant wait to see all your new projects!!
Love that you’re going for it. My husband was so sick of all my blue and green rooms in our house. He wanted an orange dining room. I agreed with the intention of changing it later. We loved it so much that we extended that orange into the kitchen when we remodeled it.
I think our paths are crossing in opposite directions. We just moved into our second house. In our first house, we were excited to escape from apartment-white walls so we went wild with color and fabric. Now, in our new house, we’ve had enough color excitement and have gone with a completely neutral palate of creme, soft green, and light khaki. The latter two are RH’s sycamore green and cafe au lait which I heart alot.
Can you please address an unrelated question? You two are so design savvy so I am sure there is an easy solution; however, I’ve been unable to find it! Here goes: when “floating” furniture in a room – for example, sofa away from a wall with side or console table flanking it – where in the holy hell do you put your lighting? If lamps are in their rightful home on the tables near the floating sofa/chairs, wont cords be tripping people left and right?! Thanks!
That’s always a challenge. Fancy designers get the floors wired with outlets so the cords can plug in right under the side tables without being a tripping hazard. But we’re not that fancy. We plan to bring in a sofa table behind the sectional and will probably place two lamps on that (since no one will be walking behind the sectional, even though it’ll float a bit away from the wall we figure it won’t be much of a tripping hazard. At least we hope not. We’ll share pics and stuff when we tackle it, even if we fail miserably!
xo,
s
A little moodier maybe but still so natural/earthy (even your color names: artichoke/avocado green, eggplant)… Love it! Can’t wait to see it in action.
I love your style but I really like more color in my spaces. I’m excited to see what you do with it!
We painted the largest room in our home in an artichoke green and I love it! We have an open floor plan and this room has a vaulted ceiling. It’s light, but with enough color. It’s very soothing and comfortable and looks great with rich browns and light wood as well.I hope you’ll use it somewhere.
I’m loving the charcoal gray couches that are cropping up everywhere. Currently in search of a good grey geometric printed fabric for curtains and an eggplant colored cushion for my beloved papasan!
Love the new color scheme!! Navy is my favorite color – looks great with everything – so I’m excited to see how you use it in the new house
I love your colours. Can’t wait to see Young House V 2.0!
I’ve always been into covering every inch of wall space with colour and a palimpsest of maps, postcards and things like that (or like this http://annabelvita.com/the-room-where-i-grew), but in our new place I’m loooooving having lots of naked cream wall. Loving it.
I absolutely love your revised decorating direction! I read your blog mostly for your home-repair adventures, since my decorating style does not trend towards the earthy/beachy/naturals side of things. Now, perhaps, I’ll see more that I can toss directly into our home!
Good luck with your closings – we’re going to need to sell our place in January (moving cross-country), and I’m getting nervous!
I love the new colors. I can’t wait to see what you do with them.
Off topic question- what do you do with all of the accessories in your home that you’re not using right now. We all know from reading how much you enjoy switching things up and moving things around but what do you do when you take something out of rotation? Get rid of it and replace it or store it and bring it out at a later date?
A little bit of both. We usually sell things that we’re over at yard sales, but if we love something like a pillow or a lamp, we’re no strangers to putting it in and out of rotation when we switch things around. That’s what closets are for, right? Haha.
xo,
s
Oh, then I will want to change all the colors in my house…. again! ;-)
I love the colors you chose and I’m also partial to cooler tones! Though I love your former beachy, refreshing look, I also like a mix! I have some bold, printed window treatments and some refreshing white ones. I have some rooms that are painted (or that we’re planning on painting) refreshing and light and some are a little more dramatic.
We’re currently working on our office and planning on a darker gray/purple in there. I was first hesitant to go against our light and refreshing “theme”, but I think with rooms like offices, bedrooms, bathrooms you can take a few more risks! Especially if you stay in the smokey sort of gray tones (blues, purples, greens) I think they all have a way of blending :)
I’m looking forward to seeing what you do with the teal and greens. I use orange, gold, brown, and teal in my loft and I never thought I would go with these colors, but I actually love it now. teal and brown looks so good together. My old color scheme was blue and white with pops of yellow. In the summer, I sometimes miss the brightness of it, but the teal/aqua shades work in the Spring.
I hope you’ll add some warm tones at least with accessories. A home isn’t complete without red and orange! My favorite room in our house is our living room that is a blue-gray with jewel tone accents. Although we have a conundrum right now. Can’t decide between red or copper. We have a little of both and it feels a bit off balance.
Oh yeah we love the idea of warm wheats, ambers, and even oranges and poppy red for accents in some spaces. Can’t wait to play around with that…
xo,
s
Can you get Porter or Pittsburgh Paints there? If so, Phoenix Fossil is a smoky gray color that we used in our library and bedroom, and we just love it.
Ok, I am SO excited to see you guys do this! THIS is exactly the color palatte that I have picked out for my new house (also closing mid-December… the big question now is which house to have Christmas in since we have about a month of overlap). The only difference is I am adding a peacock blue into my color scheme. I also am wanting a sectional for my great room, so I cannot wait to see what you pick for your house (please please don’t let that be a long time from now purchase!).
As someone who painted her whole apartment in light, neutral, YHL-inspired colors… noooooooooo!!!
Just kidding. :) I love my apartment, and it isn’t just a copy of yours– I gathered a lot of inspiration images, listened to my husband, and did what felt right for us. I just happened to go from a very saturated mental image to a light and airy reality!
I’d love to see some of the photos from your inspiration file– not as a look-and-learn kind of thing, but as a way to understand your new thinking about this scheme. I can see this looking AMAZING or looking (to me) overwhelming, so I’d love to see some rooms you love.
Oh, and in case I haven’t said “love” enough in this comment– love your blog!! This move has made me check obsessively for more details… I’m really excited. :)
Hey Maya,
We actually were just talking about how we should scan a lot of our tear sheets soon to show you guys what we’re thinking and what’s inspiring us! We even take photos of the TV when we see a set or a commercial that gets us excited.
xo,
s
YAY! I looked at the new colors and thought about the mood board you did for me with a few of the same colors. I loved the slate color you suggested (Benjamin Moore’s Alaskan Husky). Even though my room never totally came together (saving for a new house trumped buying all the new furniture), we painted and changed fabrics and it made a HUGE difference. Can’t wait to see what your new home has to hold!
What do you guys plan on doing with all your existing stuff (curtains, accessories, etc.) that fits perfectly in its existing spaces? Craigslist? Adapt it to fit in with your new scheme? It seems like it takes forever for me to get a room together, it’d be so hard to start over and I’d be tempted to just keep it all the same! Not to mention pricey. Even if you find deals the cost of putting a room together adds up!
Hey Kristen,
All of our current curtains are actually being sold with the house (except for Clara’s nursery ones since I can’t seem to let them go- sentimental mom hormones) and as for our accessories, so many of them are neutral (glass hurricanes, mercury glass votive holders, white ceramic animals, etc) that we’re confident they’ll work with the new scheme just as well as they did with the old one (fingers crossed). We’re all about working with what we’ve got!
xo,
s
I love all of these–and I think you’ll be surprised how open and airy it can still seem even with saturated walls. Especially with your love of white trim and furniture, moody walls will make all your accents look amazing.
Little story: my sister and I were hating the tan 1970s wallpaper in my parents family room back when we were both living at home, and one night while watching ‘Trading Spaces’ we decided to pull it down and convince them we should paint the room a dark sea green to make the white leather couches ‘pop.’ After we tore down the wallpaper (came right off!) in less than an hour, we called them down and asked them if they noticed anything different. It took them a LONG time to figure it out, and once they did, my mom exclaimed, “I’d always wanted to tear that stuff down!”
Needless to say, the room is still green nearly 10 years later and they still love it. :)
I like the gray/green, not a fan of the plum. But you’ll probably make it look fabulous anyway :)
As for me, I’m definitely more a fan of the soft, subtle, and beachy look and since I don’t like change (boring, huh), subtle and beachy it stays… :)
What do you all think about accent walls? I don’t think you have any in your house. I’m thinking they are on the way out. I want to bring gray into my bedroom but don’t want to have to paint the whole room. I have a beige in there now. Decision, decisions…
We think they can be done really well and done really terribly (kind of like everything else in home decor). It really seems to depend on the room’s orientation/shape/layout and the color that is used on the rest of the walls. Who knows if we’ll add them to our new house, but they’re definitely a possibility!
xo,
s
I have come to the realization that I live in a brown house. Khaki walls. Mushroom sofa. Golden Wheat lampshades. Dark leather chair and ottoman. Builder light brown carpet. Limestone colored tile. St. Cecelia Granite. Brown hounds tooth drapes.
GET. ME. OUT. OF. HERE!!!!!
Funny you mention mocha and browns going gray and gray-blue because that’s exactly what my apartment has been doing. I’ve always been a girl for greens and browns, but now I look around my little apartment and everything is turning slate gray, black brown, mahogany and a soft blue.
haha your possible house color scheme matches my fall/winter wardrobe to a T. I love these colors! I spotted an eggplant purple bathroom mat at Homegoods the other day and started daydreaming about how pretty it would be to build a bathroom color scheme around it =) I can’t wait to see what you kids come up with!
xoXOxo
Jenn L @ Peas & Crayons
I LOVE these new colors and can’t wait to see what you do. I often find pics online of rooms in similar hues and would love to try them, but I find that as much as I love to see them in other homes, I am very particular with the colors I actually live in. Like that gray color you have on the top row – I love it, and would love to paint a few rooms that color, or even darker. But I need color (I hate neutrals) and I need light. I think I would go insane in a room that dark. What about you? Does that concern you, or are you thinking to only use those colors in accessories, not painting a whole room in any of those darker colors?
We definitely plan to bring in some gray walls. We’ve seen it done gorgeously so we’re working up the guts to go for it! We’ll share pics as we go!
xo,
s
I’m so happy to see you’re trying some new colors! My husband and I recently moved into a fixer-upper and my living/dining room area is filled with smoky blues and rich taupe-y greys. I felt like the only one not painting my walls cream! Can’t wait to see!
My living room is painted in “Blue Gray Slate,” accented with orange and lime green.
My office was just painted in “Mocha Accent” by Behr. My desk and bookshelves will be black and I might work the lime green in there too.
My bedroom is painted with “Vintage” by Behr, a pretty silvery purple shade. My bedspread is a silvery gray, but lately I’ve been admiring purple with brown, so I might change some things.
Lately I’ve been thinking about painting a room black. Maybe the kitchen? :)
I love, love, love these colours. To be honest, I’m probably a bit bias since these are very similar colours to what we have in our own home :) I love that you guys are trying something different, little more bolder, and may I make a suggestion? When you paint your trim, maybe try a softer cream colour (we have BM’s Bronzed Beige). We originally painted all our trim BM’s Cotton Ball and ended up hating it – with our wall colours it came across as rather stark and cold and gave a completely different feeling to our whole home. Thank goodness paint is so easy to change!
Good luck!!
Love it! Thanks for the suggestion!
xo,
s
Have you guys come across any great stores/sites for graphic print curtain panels in your brainstorming? I’m dying to swap out my solid panels with something a little more fun and punchy.
We’re planning to DIY them with fabric that we love just like we did here. So easy- no sewing required!
xo,
s
I just re-did my living room in a gray, black, white and eggplant theme. I’m really into purple right now! I got drapes from Target in a deep eggplant color, they look fantastic! Can’t wait to see what you two come up with!
I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE your blog. And, my husband and I just got married in August and just bought our first home earlier this month in Texas. I cannot WAIT to see your new color schemes coming together and switching up. We decided to move in with all our colors as they are while we figure out exactly what we want! and paint and design room-by-room. :)
me likey!
I love the colors!
After 8 years of living w/ a horrible peachy tan (gag!) I finally repainted our large family/living room and hallways in a gorgeous medium tone gray, Porpoise and a lighter Gentle Rain by Behr. We have a large art collection and they all came to life against these grays not to mention making the rooms look crisp, clean and airy.
I had also planned on painting out all of the trim work and the two large windows but they now look gorgeous against the new wall colors. Accent colors are orange and slate blue when the room is clean and every color in the rainbow when my two little girls have their toys out! :-)
Mmm…loving those new colors. It’s fun to watch the development of your design aesthetic over time!
I love repainting (as weird as that sounds). Partly because I sit and give instructions and complain how the paint is giving me a headache whenever I am asked to help…oh yea and being 5ft is a great cop out too! “Oh but hon your so much taller than me…I cant reach that far” hehe.
http://jannsboutique.blogspot.com/
I’m dreaming about our master bedroom right now. Currently, it’s a golden brown color called Cracker Bitz and we have deep red bedding. Problem is we have no overhead light in that room, so it starts to feel small and dark at night. I’m obsessing over pure white linens and a light tan/dark cream paint color to lighten and brighten and balance the dark wood furniture.