A few weeks ago I wrote about our upcoming design projects for the rest of this year, and surprisingly the living room wasn’t on it. It wasn’t on the list because I was fairly certain it was functional enough for the time being. Until I wrote about what’s wrong with my living room and I pretty much convinced myself that we needed to repaint and choose the perfect white paint for the living room. I knew I wanted to get rid of the tonal colors, all while I thought about the true design of the space.
One of the best pieces of advice I ever got was to, “let things evolve” when it comes to your home. You can design all the mood boards, buy everything you wanted and you wouldn’t have given the room enough time to grow.
This is exactly what I planned on doing with each room in our home, starting with the living room of course. But it finally started evolving from tone on tone to a more traditional design. My heart will always love a European flair, and I think that is the exact direction we’re heading with this living room. I mean it only makes sense, our European farmhouse bathroom is calling out for some unanimity.
So here we are with a new paint job, thanks to Benjamin Moores Simply White we were able to cover the tan paint I did a few months back in just two coats. It always amazes me what paint can do for a room, and the mood it can change. This was how I choose the right white paint for the living room.
Choose the right shade of white for the living room
You may remember this graphic I put together for our chic home office update post. But let’s get right into choosing the perfect white paint for the living room.
As you can see there are so many shades of white, and in turn there a few questions you should ask yourself when choosing the white paint.
What is the colour palette of the room? does the colour of your furniture pull more cool, neutral or warm?
I always start by gauging the vibe of the room you’re painting. If the color palette of your furniture pulls warmer, choose a warm white. If it’s neutral I always choose a warmer shade of white.
What kind of light does the living room have? do you get a lot of green from the trees, blue from the water, or grey from the buildings?
If you are choosing the perfect white paint for the living room you need to think about the kind of light your space has. I always aim for a color that is complementary to the light, rather than conflicting and competing. For our particular living room, we have a lot of green from the tree’s and I ended up going with Simply White by Benjamin Moore because it pulls green.
Choose several shades of white and test them before you paint the entire room.
I can’t stress how important it is to test paints out before you commit! I have made so many mistakes over the years and hated the living room color, cough* living room. I’ve learned that you can test the paint using a white sheet of paper rather than on the wall. That way you can move it around the room and see the tone, light, and how it looks against certain pieces of furniture.
SO now that you know everything I do about choosing the perfect white paint for the living room, I think you’re ready to update your beautiful living room!
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