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Accent Wall Color Harmony Pulls the Room Together – Part Three

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Accent Walls: Pulling It All Together

In the two previous articles about how to create a successful accent wall we analyzed Accent Wall Mistakes to Avoid and how to Make the Most of Fireplace Accent Walls.

This third article is about looking at the big picture so the color and shade of the accent wall works in harmony with the rest of your room.

Personal stylist, Doreen Dove, suggests when you wear a color accent accessory (scarf, purse, shoes) that it repeats a color in your main outfit. This makes you look thoughtfully pulled-together rather than like you added a last-minute splash of color.

This concept applies to adding accent colors to your home.

If you don’t know what color to use, look at your chosen wall. Is there a painting or piece of artwork there that you love? Pick a color from within the painting, ideally not the dominant color in the picture, and use a variation of it for your accent wall color.

A client and I were looking for a warm yellow for a room that would harmonize with brilliantly hued art photograph. The first color my client picked looked on her wall an “off” yellow. Together we looked deeply into the picture and found a warm yellow in a small spot on an apple. (We’re talking about a small spot of color in a large photo.) As a paint color it gave the room a warmth the other yellow lacked and worked well with all the colors in the the artwork itself. We nicknamed it “golden apple yellow”.

Note: Often the best wall color is not a literal rendering of this color. The color may need to be a version that is either more bold or more subtle. Remember an accent wall is just that – an accent to highlight the whole – not something that draws attention only to itself.

See these successful harmonious accent walls:

Kitchen accent wall in terra cotta orange
The bold color of this kitchen accent wall highlights the pottery and harmonizes with the table and chairs.

In this kitchen a storage wall is the accent wall. See how the bold color highlights the pottery display, while the orange tone picks up the wood tones in the table and chairs. This is an example of finding a color in a room and taking it a step or two bolder, thus pulling the room together.

If you don’t have a special something on your accent wall, look at the rest of the room. Do you have a colorful throw pillow you love?, or a patterned rug with a color you can use on your wall?
 
 

Modern living room with terra cotta accent wall
Rich terra cotta wall gives this large neutral space warmth and drama.

This is a room full of neutral tones. Although the architecture is striking, the space would be vast and boring (think airplane hanger) without the accent wall. You can find this warm terra cotta color in the lower right quadrant of the painting on that wall. Using a bold earthy color here stands-up to the large neutral space and frames the green garden seen through the window. I would add some accent pillows on the chairs in a color similar to the wall to further enliven and tie-together the entire space.
 
 
 

Accent Walls Can Be Fun, Daring and Sophisticated, If You Know:

  • Which walls work best as accent walls,
  • How to make the most of a fireplace accent wall,
  • Harmonize the accent wall color with something else in the room.

Want help making the most of colors in your home? Contact me for a personal consultation.

Let me know about your experiences with accent walls and colors in the comments below. I would love to hear from you.

Fireplace Accent Wall: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

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A fireplace is a promise of warmth, light, relaxation, and gathering together. A fireplace accent wall celebrates this.

This is the second in a series on How to Avoid Accent Wall Mistakes.

If you have a fireplace (functioning or not) it is, by definition, the focal point of the room: visually, functionally, and energetically. If your fireplace is the focal point of the room that wall would be perfect for a fireplace accent wall, right?
Not always.

Ask yourself, is your fireplace attractive on its own, or is it just taking up wall space. A colorful wall is not an accent wall unless the color frames or hightlights s
omething bold and dramatic, something worth looking at. (See Accent Walls Mistakes to Avoid for photos and more.)

If your fireplace is:

  • Just a hole in the wall
  • framed by a bland, outdated or unattractive mantelpiece, or
  • topped by a boring piece of art or framed mirror.

This is not a wall that should be made an accent wall.

red fireplace accent wall failure
The Ugly: There is nothing attractive about this fireplace accent wall. The red color is highlighting a nothing.

This fireplace accent wall is underwhelming.

  • The fireplace is not attractive on it’s own,
  • The mirror above it is undistinquished, and
  • Framing the doorway in color make the wall look off balance.

 
 

Fireplace accent wall battling with room focused on TV
The Bad: This room is arranged to focus on the flat screen TV (far left). The accent wall ends up a miscellaneous decoration.

The focal point of this room and the furniture arrangement is the flat screen TV (far left), not the fireplace. Adding an accent color to this fireplace wall creates two focal points for this room – which is distracting and confusing.
 
 
 
 
 

This fireplace accent wall is a successful focal point for this room.

Teal fireplace accent wall is true focal point
The Good: This accent wall highlights the true focal point of the room.

This mantelpiece is attractive and deserves to be highlighted with color. Furniture is arranged to frame the fireplace and creates a comfortable seating and conversation area – it meets the promise of the fireplace itself.
 
 
 
 
 
Building on this and the ideas of the previous Accent Wall article, be sure your fireplace wall is up to being the focal point of the room before adding accent colors.

Next: Accent Wall Color Harmony

Get a personal color, feng shui or home design consultation. Contact me!

Accent Wall Mistakes to Avoid: Color Alone Does Not Make a Successful Accent Wall

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People frequently ask me about accent walls when I’m teaching my class: Choose Colors with Confidence. It’s easy to make accent wall mistakes. I decided to go into more depth on accent walls for a recent presentation. Searching for example photos I saw many sad mistakes.

Accent walls are popular because they’re featured in so many home makeovers. I believe this is because the TV decorators have twenty four hours and a budget of $1.98 to transform a room for the “big reveal.” Painting a wall in a bold color and grouping all the best pieces from the room in front it is a quick and easy solution for dramatic television visuals.

So why so many sad mistakes when creating accent walls in the real world?

Learn How to Avoid Accent Wall Mistakes. Learn the logic to successful accent walls here.

This is the first of a series of articles that will show you when to use accent walls and how to make them a success in your home.

I rarely recommend accent walls just to have an accent wall because they can visually chop-up the look of a room.

I suggest an accent wall when it is desired by a client and supports an existing or planned focal point of a room.

An accent wall by it’s nature becomes the focus of the room. Your eye is automatically drawn to that area of color. But looking at some of the photos, I noticed that I felt cheated because the furniture and artwork framed by the accent wall were bland and boring. As a viewer I wanted a bigger payoff. If you are going to use an accent wall you need some drama there. Without drama this is an accent wall mistake.

Accent walls are most successful when they:

  • Frame a large and bold piece of art that is the focal point of the room
  • Frame a large and dramatic headboard in a master bedroom, when there are no other competing decorative or architectural features.
  • Highlght an architectural element:
  • A large wall that works as a sculptural element in the space.
  • A large and beautifully designed mantelpiece.
  • In a very large space that has nothing architecturally or decoratively interesting in it, a bold color on a large wall can work.

living room with sage green accent wall mistake
This accent wall is a missed opportunity. Color alone will not create enough interest.

This is an example of an accent wall that falls short. There needs to be more drama on that wall. And the accent wall makes the room look smaller.

 
 
 
 
 
 

orange accent storage wall in kitchen
Bold color on a bold wall makes a successful accent wall.

Here is an example of a bold color highlighting a wall that is big and works like a sculptural element in the space.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

accent wall mistake: bedroom with gray accent wall on side
This accent wall would be much more effective behind the headboard and framing the yellow painting.

Here is a missed opportunity. This dark gray wall would be so much more effective if it was behind the bed and framing the artwork above the headboard.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
White and gray master bedroom with blue accent wall.
White and gray master bedroom with blue accent wall. Success!

This is an example of a successful accent wall. The room itself is rather unadorned architecturally. With the artwork on the wall, the accent wall anchors and supports the bed and provides some decorative drama to the room.
 

Avoid Accent Wall Mistakes: Successful accent walls work in harmony with other elements to create a focal point for the room.

What experiences have you had with accent walls? Join the conversation below.

Next article: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly of Fireplace Accent Walls.

Curious about Color and Feng Shui? Click here!

If you would like a color consultation, a feng shui or interior psychology consultation, please contact me today.

Feng Shui Color: Energy Made Visible and Beautiful

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Use Color to Bring New Feng Shui Energy into Your Home

Bring the glorious colors of Nature indoors to Feng Shui energize your home or office. If you are itching to paint your space, now is the time to do it. New color is one of the best ways to freshen a room.

color feng shui paint sample
Use color to bring new Feng Shui energy into your home.

We will briefly discuss:

  • Color and Feng Shui
  • Color and Light: how to pick the best colors and tones for your rooms.
  • Painting with Intention.
  • Feng Shui and Color

Color is a great way of doing “Sneaky Feng Shui”: Feng Shui that is very powerful, yet is not obvious.

Color is one of the Feng Shui Nine Cures.

Color is a form of light energy. Each color has a specific energy. Color has a direct impact on a space and the people using the space.

A color will work for you only if you love the color and feel good with it.

If there is a color that you are really drawn to, it usually means that there is a specific energy from that color that you need now.

feng shui color ba-gua

Colors assigned to the Guas of the Ba-Gua are meant to be used as accent colors, not room colors.

A black accent piece is fine for the career area. But do not paint your front foyer black to match the Gua color.

There are only two “No-No” wall colors for bedrooms: Red and Black.

If you paint your bedroom red, I guarantee you will have difficulty sleeping.  In a red bedroom you will either have heated arguments or very hot sex, I can’t guarantee which. Pink is a good color, only I don’t know too many men who are “into” pink. A flesh tone on the wall, such as a “beiged” pink, can be a subtly sensuous. Or, try pink sheets for romance or red sheets if you really want to heat things up.

Your teenager may be talking about painting his room black.  Black painted walls literally absorb the light energy in a space. It turns a room into a Black Hole – very depressing.  If there is no way around black walls, then high gloss or gloss paint in black will reflect some light and not be as oppressive.

If you or someone in your family has difficulty sleeping, try bed sheets in a soft color with little or no pattern. Research suggests that our skin absorbs color energy. Those turquoise or Spiderman sheets may have too much color energy.

Color and Light: How to pick the best tones for your rooms.

The choice of paint colors today is limitless, but can be overwhelming.  Here are some ideas to help you select your colors.

Decorating with Feng Shui is about more than looks, it is about how you feel in a space.

A color that looks dramatic on TV or in a decorating magazine may be too strong to live with.  Rooms on television or in print are decorated so they will have visual impact.  People can feel restless or ill in a space with colors that are overwhelming. Save that dramatic color for an accent piece, a foyer or a hallway that you move through but don’t spend time in.

Light bounces off walls. Walls that have very bright or saturated colors will tint the light with some of that color. This explains why everything in a bright green room looks a little green.

Always make your final color choice in the room you are going to paint.

Color and light are inseparable. Different kinds of light can make the same paint chip look very different. Fluorescent lighting in a paint store will make colors look paler and cooler than they really are – when that color goes on the wall it will look brighter and stronger than you intended. This is why your neighbor has a neon yellow house.

I recommend that you use wall colors that look like they come from nature.  Some paint colors look “synthetic” – too bright, too pale or too grayed down.

Take advantage of the sample sizes of paints that available now.  Paint a patch on the wall or a poster board 18 inches by 18 inches to really see the color. Do this with several tones of a color to help you make a choice you will love.

Computer matching of color: it is best to bring a sample that is a solid color on a smooth surface. Multiple colors or textured surfaces will cause the computer to blend the colors or tones it “sees”.

New England tends to have “cool” sunlight. I recommend colors with a warm undertone to correct for this.  If you want to work with a blue, a blue that leans toward periwinkle works better.  If yellow is the color you love, find a yellow with a golden undertone. Different parts of the country (and the world) have different kinds of light, so colors need to been selected where they will be used.

With all of the many paint colors available, you can find the best shade or tone of your favorite color for your home or office.

Painting-In Intentions

Intentions in paint: Normand Poulin, a Feng Shui colleague, shared this with me.  If you are painting your own space, make the first paint strokes on the wall words of intention. Paint on the wall with your roller or brush a word like “harmony”, “love” or “prosperity”. Then continue and blend in the word as you paint the wall. You can say a prayer or do the intention ritual while you do this.  You are “imprinting” your intention into the walls and in the space.

Most important of all, love the colors you are using. And have fun!

paint sample image by C2 Paints
Feng Shui Color Ba-Gua by Linda Varone

To see more about Linda Varone’s Color Confidence click here

Feng Shui Ecology: Going Green Shouldn’t Leave You Looking Green – with updates

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The right compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL) can make the difference between a warm, welcoming room and a home that looks like a cheap discount store. A number of my green conscious clients complain their new CFL’s make a stark unattractive light. They miss the warmth of incandescent (Edison) light bulbs. (I admit that I exaggerate a little – no one looks green, but the wrong CFL’s will make you look pale and sickly.)

compact fluorescent bulb
Choose the right kind of compact fluorescent

The remedy to this is “warm white” or “soft white” CFL’s with a color temperature between 2700 K to 3000 K, which approximates the warm light of 2400K incandescent light bulbs.

“Bright white” CFL’s have a color temperature of 3500 K. These are best for situations where you need bright light – such as craft work. Please note that CFL’s labeled “sunlight” or “daylight” are cool white fluorescent and only suitable for precision work areas.

Unfortunately light bulb manufacturers do not offer color temperature or Kelvin information on their packaging. You will either have to trust the “warm white” or “soft white” labels or go online and double check the color temperature ratings of specific bulbs.  Sparsam™ CFL’s (available only at IKEA stores) provide the warm light of incandescent bulbs.

Update #1: Since I first wrote this blog there have been changes in the manufacturing and labeling of light bulbs. A new label “Lighting Facts”, which looks similar to the nutrition facts labels on food, will list brightness – in lumens, estimated yearly cost to use the bulb, estimated life of a bulb, “light appearance” using a “warm/cool” scale and degrees Kelvin.

Hint #1 : I find that I need more wattage than the conversion factor listed on the label. If you want to get 75 watts of illumination you will do better with an 18 watt CFL than a 15 Watt CFL.  I honestly don’t know why this is.  If anyone knows, please contact me.

Hint #2 : CFL’s contain mercury, so dispose of them as a toxic material at special recycling places, or see if your retailer will accept them for safe disposal.

Update #2: CFL’s now contain 60-75% LESS mercury than previously. Continue to dispose of the carefully.

Update #3: To get the full estimated life expectancy from a compact fluorescent bulb, they should have as little on/off activity as possible. Also they need to be in a vented fixture. This means a lamp should have some air vents or heat outlets, rather than in a fixture with a solid metal or plastic covering. Similarly, CFLs in recessed ceiling fixtures need to have heat vents in the fixtures.

Take a look around your home and see if you have lighting in the right places and if your light bulbs give you the warmth that makes your space inviting, relaxing and user-friendly.