Freshen Up Your Home With Color

Bring a new dimension and experience to your life by transforming your home inside and out with new colors. Invigorate your outdated family room and energize your bedroom with one of the new hot color trends of the season.  A fresh coat or two of paint can instantly change the mood, ambiance and energy of a room. When selecting paint colors for your home its imperative to know what mood you are trying to achieve, how you intend to use the space and more importantly which colors you really love. Are you drawn to calming neutral schemes or bright colorful spaces? For thousands of years China, India and Egypt have studied the philosophies and relationships between color and energy – in order to strike a spiritual balance in their lives. So before you head down to the paint store, here is some insight into the mood provoking colors of the rainbow and the energies they emit.

Red

• Its intensity has a stimulating and exciting effect.
• Is a warm and seductive color that exudes power and confidence.
• Wonderful in elegant dining rooms, bedrooms and powder rooms.

Photo: via House Beautiful    Dressing Room

Orange

• An energizing, lively and an invigorating warm color.
• Evokes enthusiasm, self-confidence and creativity.
• Great as accent walls in living rooms, dining rooms and baths.

Photo via Elle Décor             Kid’s Bathroom

Yellow

• Rejuvenates and stimulates your mind, body and soul.
• Sparks imagination and innovation.
• Epitomizes warmth and an optimistic outlook to the future.

Photo via Country Living

Green

• A very popular color due in part to its calming and restful affect.
• Varying shades of green evoke a stable and secure environment.
• Creates a sense of balance and harmony.
• A cool nurturing color that promotes healing and re-growth.
• Ideal for bedrooms, baths and dens – an ideal color to blend into the natural environment.

Designer: Lori Dennis

Blue

• Represents communication, reliability, peace, tranquility and truth.
• An intellectual color that evokes a protective mood.
• Is an expansive color and tends to visually enlarge a space.
• Is a wonderful bedroom accent color – due to its calming effect.

Photo: Simon Upton   Designer: Nate Berkus

Indigo/Violet

• Color of spirituality and intuition.
• Defines elegance and refined luxury.
• Represents a sense of power and royalty.
• Perfect color for studies, libraries and bedrooms.
• Works beautifully with rich woods and metals.

Photo via House Beautiful                  Library

Neutral

• Brown, gold and grey are easy on the mind’s eye and sooth the spirit.
• Brown used in moderation inspires elegance and richness.
• Incorporating natural materials and elements in any space will evoke a more balanced atmosphere.

Photo via Décor Pad

Black and White

• White represents simplicity, cleanliness and vibrancy when in perfect balance.
• Black is an absorbing color and is best used as a stabilizer and anchor.
• Used together creates a dramatic environment.

Photo: Joshua McHugh for Architectural Digest

Always consider the mood and energy you want to create in your space – paint a few sample walls – then go for it! Which colors are you drawn to? Stay Inspired! I encourage you leave questions or comments below this post, and fill out the form on the right hand side of this page to receive your free copy of my special report: “15 Money Saving Strategies When Planning Your Home Renovation” Article by Lori Gilder, Architectural Interior Designer, Los Angeles, Ca. © 2011 Lori Gilder. Interior Makeovers Inc.