Our house’s colors

3 April 2014

This past weekend John and I had what I think of as the stereotypical homeowners’ weekend – we did little else besides checking off a long list of things on a household to do list we’d been adding to for several weeks. It was really good, actually, even though we did make eight (yes) separate trips to various home and garden stores in two days. Efficient we are not.

For us, a weekend like this is something to report on, since we don’t actually have them too often. John and I really love our weekends – we like to fill them with everyday adventures – and one thing we agreed on when we were buying our house is that we didn’t want to lose them to lawn care and home maintenance. Happily, we haven’t! Even so, we still need to get things done every once in a while.

My relationship with our house this first year has been interesting, and I’m looking forward to sorting through those feelings and sharing them with y’all – hopefully in about a month and a half, on the anniversary of our closing. In the meantime, I thought it might be fun to share a bit about our whole house color scheme. As I’ve shared before, our entry, kitchen, dining, and living room are all open to each other, so when we make decorating decisions for any one room, we have to take the impact on the other spaces into consideration. Since we’re collecting things over time, the board below helps me visualize many of the elements – some of which we’ve already put in place, some of which we’re considering – together.

main-room-color-scheme

Though I am often drawn to neutral spaces (as you can see on my home Pinterest board), when it comes down to making a decision for our home, I almost always go for something more colorful — but with a classic base. Classic with a twist, if you will, just like what we were going for with our wedding!

Also, do these colors look familiar? They’re almost exactly the same as the ones I chose for Em for Marvelous! I guess I know what I like :)

Here’s some more colorful and classic inspiration I’ve collected:

jana bek

Jana Bek

style at home

Style at Home

society social

Society Social

young house love

Young House Love

caitlin wilson

Caitlin Wilson

lonny

Lonny

colorful australia

Style at Home

southern living

Southern Living

boston magazine

Boston Magazine

young house love entry

Young House Love

style-at-home-2

Style at Home

Do you tend to gravitate toward neutrals or color? Or perhaps a more narrow palette than ours? I’d love to hear!

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Laura
April 3, 2014 9:39 am

I love your inspiration photos! I find them to be so bright and happy. But do you ever get any push back from John? If I tried to bring in any pink/orange/purple decor, my husband would immediately claim that it’s too “girly.” That has been my biggest decor struggle since getting married, merging his very masculine/traditional taste with my more feminine/rustic taste.

April 3, 2014 10:00 am

I wish I was bold enough to decorate with all of that color. :) The inspiration photos are lovely. I am a neutral kind of gal myself, but I am always drawn to photos like the ones above. I can’t wait to see what you guys end up doing!

Em
April 3, 2014 11:03 am

Hi Laura! Yes, I know exactly what you mean, and almost discussed it in the post but didn’t want to make it too long! I am definitely conscious of limiting the amount of pink or other “girly” colors out of respect for John, and I would say that the inspiration photos include more pink than I’ll ever get in our house :) I find that if I stick to corals or peaches, they are more acceptable than out-and-out pink. And, one of the largest sources of pink/purple, that twilight canvas, is a photo from our wedding, so I get a pass on that :)

April 3, 2014 12:08 pm

I tend to have a neutral base for my spaces, with warm whites and wood as the foundation and pops of color to accent. I really like the colors and items in that collage above! My eye was drawn immediately to the Anthropologie and Rifle Paper Co. pieces :)

ZOE
April 3, 2014 12:31 pm

It is interesting how your wedding choices are reflected in your home. I find that too. Our wedding was joyful with pops of colour against some more neutral details and I think that is reflected in our flat. I think I tend to find a different colour theme in each room – reds and purples in our living room whereas there is a more pastel palette in the bedrooms. I am so excited for a move into a larger home to think about all these wonderful decisions again.

April 3, 2014 1:39 pm

oooh what a good round up. I have a few of those houses as inspiration for decorating the living room in the house we are about to move into. I’m excited to see how this all looks in your home, I can’t believe you have been in there for a year!

April 3, 2014 5:21 pm

I love the combination of white and color in these photos. Thanks for the inspiration!

April 3, 2014 7:31 pm

This is so lovely! I love your inspiration, and am excited to see as you deck out your home- so fun! I’m a neutrals girl through and through, but will live vicariously through you! :)

April 3, 2014 8:34 pm

You are too cute, really! I love this blog post and hope to someday visit your (surely!) adorable home. I love the board you’ve created, especially the photo which I believe is from your wedding. I think the colors in the sky tie everything together perfectly. I also love the fact that we’re recipe box twins – I was given the one above and I bought my sister one of the other colors. Too fun!

Rob
April 3, 2014 9:00 pm

I like the birds on the wall.

December 9, 2015 7:06 pm

Hi Em, just seeing this – thank you so much for the shout-out! Your support is greatly appreciated!

XX jana