Ooooooh ... paint. It's such tactile, sensuous stuff. And best not to start me on colour. Put a colour chart in my hands and I'll be dreamily occupied for hours. Possibly days.
Over the years, I've busted a couple of myths about colour:
Myth 1: Dark colours make a room look smaller. Piffle, I say. Quite the opposite really - a small white room can feel boringly boxy, whereas a deep, rich hue can create the feeling of - well, depth.
Myth 2: Go for a lighter colour, as it always looks darker on the wall. Pffffff. Be brave: Go darker and earthier. When it's on the wall and the light comes (hopefully) flooding in, you'll be left with rich and/or vibrant, rather than insipid or garish.
... which was exactly how we ran with the studio, and we're very, very happy with the result:
Feature wall (against which Grace is so stylishly poised): Porter's Gunmetal Grey - a moody slate grey-blue - in Ultra Flat. Ultra Flat is loaded with pigment, and dries to the most intense, velvety, colour-saturated finish.
Walls and lower ceiling: Porter's Eggshell Acrylic in Marble. Looks white white in the photo, (and yet alarmingly dark in the tin) but in real life dries to a rich off-white with an almost greenish - well, marble-like - tinge. And the finish has all the lustre and feel of eggshell, without the fragility.
I'm a big fan of Porter's. I figure I save thousands doing it myself, so why not buy the best, most luxurious paint? Besides, it's a handmade, proudly Australian product; they do the richest, most stunning colours imagineable; it goes on like buttermilk; and smells fresh as a field of daisies when you're done. Take a big, healthy breath - it's VOC free.
