There are fun design decisions (tile color! stone selection! lighting!) and stressful design decisions (tile grout, trim paint, window design), and choosing the right paint color for your exterior falls into “stressful” for me. It’s usually extremely expensive ($10K-$30K+) and you don’t want to have to redo it for decades. It can drastically change your experience driving up to your house and certainly will affect curb appeal and resale (I know we shouldn’t think about resale value all the time but y’all, very few people will buy a lime green house). And yet, doing something too safe can be such a missed opportunity. Portland is FULL of colorful vintage houses which adds so much quirk and charm to a neighborhood. But when do you take a color risk? And when do you go safe? I thought I’d show you the exterior of our houses first so you can get a sense of where my mind is at, and while I’m NOT an expert, I do have experience, thoughts, and feelings.
Glendale House – Before/After – 1950s
White Paint: Calm by Benjamin Moore | Gray Paint: Boothbay Gray by Benjamin Moore
I’m a bit risk-averse when it comes to permanent decisions (which I’m not proud of all the time, actually) which can feel a bit boring in this age of color and pattern. But I’m still so glad that we painted this house a crisp but not too cold white, with the blue/gray and black accents. It was in sunny California, it was TALL (so a darker color could have looked really intense/overwhelming), and it was mid-century so I wasn’t going to mix like 3 colors. It was also west-facing (so any color would have looked FAR more intense when the sun was on it, which it was all the time) and this white felt fresh and very much matched the interior style. There was no setback in this house either – it was on the street so a bolder color could have been a real risky choice for the whole neighborhood. We plastered some of the walls to add some variation, depth, and texture. As you can see we cladded the majority of the house and painted the big stacked cinder blocks. I certainly didn’t want a traditional color (a muted neutral) and while I could have gone with a pretty blue or green, this white felt right and we were super happy with it.
Los Feliz House – 1921 Tudor
Blue Trim Paint Color: Down Pipe by Farrow & Ball
This house had the original exterior finish (I think a type of stucco?) where the color is mixed into the material and painting it just felt so wrong. So we left the finish and just played with the trim and window frame colors. I really loved how these colors played off each other and made it feel more “me” but what I do regret doing is painting the garage doors the white. Now I don’t remember if they just came white or if we painted them (I feel like I’m like Dory these days – I remember NOTHING unless it’s important), but I think the white got too much attention and the darker blue of the trim would have blended nicer. We chose the gray blue and cream to work with the tones of the plaster and it all felt so appropriate, vintage, and pretty.
The Mountain House – 1970s A-Frame
This house was another sad neutral that needed a point of view. It was a really gray sage which is starting to convince me that medium-toned colors might not be my favorite – that either light neutral, dark neutral, or a color might be more my preference.
We chose Laurel Woods by Sherwin-Williams and it’s PERFECT. I love this color. It can look really dark at night, but still pretty happy during the day.
Green Exterior Paint: Laurel Woods by Sherwin-Williams | Door and Back Deck Paint: Tricorn Black by Sherwin-Williams | Front Deck and Exterior Brick (not shown): Iron Ore by Sherwin-Williams
For this house, we did need to get the color approved by the HOA and I guess green isn’t typically on their list (which seems totally weird since it’s a mountain town and full of trees). But we got this one approved. We chose green because I wanted something dark and moody up here, but wanted it to blend into the surroundings, not pop out. It’s surrounded by trees and it’s meant to feel like a modern cabin so a dark green (but not too dark) felt perfect. I still love this color and think it was the right choice (especially with the almost black trim).
The Farmhouse – 1910
Exterior Paint: Pure White by Sherwin-Williams | Old Gray Trim Paint: Online by Sherwin-Williams | Blue Deck Doors Paint: Smoky Blue by Sherwin-Williams
I really struggled with this because Brian was SET on white and I was in the middle of such decision fatigue and self-doubt that I was like “ok, white it is”. Of course, there are a million whites to choose from so I still had to pick a color (we went with Pure White which we love, but it is PURE white so know that it’s bright). Now that all the landscaping has grown in with so much green, pink, and darker tones I’m so happy that it’s white – it feels really appropriate for a farmhouse and very classic.
I took these two iPhone shots recently, now realizing we need to get some new professional photos of the exterior, but you can see how the landscaping pops and it looks really really pretty, IMHO. 🙂
The Fig House – A Wedding Venue
10 years ago I designed The Fig House – an event space in Los Angeles and we painted it Hague Blue (by Farrow & Ball). It’s still one of my favorite colors. As you can see at night it’s one color and below, during the day it’s far more bright/saturated.
We loved the brightness and I think a lot of people wanted that for their wedding photos, but it’s a good example of how more pigmented colors change in the light.
And now for a few things to think about (that I thought about when we were deciding)…
What Region Do You Live In And What Vibe Is Your Neighborhood?
Obviously, Arizona is going to be more neutral, warm, and desert-y (and I would think you wouldn’t paint your house black since it’s so hot there), but then you look at Palm Springs and there are tons of pastels! Another example is that it could be kinda of weird to have a brown house in Key West when the rest of the houses are colorful. So while you shouldn’t let the region dictate your style, I would also want it to feel appropriate and not be the sore thumb.
But even within regions, there are vibes that you can lean into. Portland has so many vintage bungalows, Craftsman, and Victorian houses. Walking through some of the neighborhoods in NW or NE is so fun because of all the colors. If a vintage house has a lot of trim details, railings, moldings, etc – I think it’s a great opportunity to do something really unique (even if you do keep it safe). The more modern approach is to paint everything tonal and I think that can look good, but there is also something to be said for leaning into the whimsy of your house and you can handle it (and not missing that opportunity). I’m dying to do a Victorian house and you bet I’d paint it a few different colors and lean into bringing out the architecture and details.
What Color Are The Windows Frames?
A lot of newer houses (1980+) have white vinyl windows and we all know that replacing windows is extremely expensive. So if this is you, I’d try to paint your house a color that would work with your windows instead of making the white pop. My opinion is to go lighter or at least to paint the window trim white so that the vinyl windows recede and don’t become the focus.
Wait, When Can We Go Wacky?
Y’all. This is HARD. A wacky house, in a wacky neighborhood can be sooooo FUN. I love the right yellow house (with the right landscaping around it). I love a pink house, red house, cobalt blue, or even lavender (in the right neighborhood) and I don’t ever want anyone to tame themselves if they think they can handle a brightly colored home. Would I personally ever paint a house orange or lime green (or a combo of both?), probably not. But I could definitely see myself doing a blue/pink/yellow/red or green house if it’s a smaller house and the neighborhood could handle it.
The Bigger The House The More Color/Bold You’ll See
This is just basic science, LOL. Bigger = more, so while a small swatch might not be overwhelming sometimes the whole house can be once it’s painted. Same with the tone of the color – a color with a ton of pigment will go brighter and bolder with a lot of sun on it (in which case doing a more muted version might get you what you want). Maybe that’s where I’m going – if you have a big house, choosing a safer and more muted color might be the way to go whereas a smaller house can handle a bolder color because there’s simply less of it.
What Do You Think? What Is Your Favorite Exterior Paint Colors In Your Region?
I’d love to know your thoughts and feelings. I’ve only lived in New York (where we didn’t own), California, and Oregon. So for those of you looking for more advice please let us know. Do you love having a dark house? Do you regret the color you chose and why?
Opening Image Credits: Photo by Sara Ligorria-Tramp | From: Our Home Exterior Renovation
Love this post! I just bought my first home at age 45- a 1900 Victorian fixer upper in a charming town in Connecticut. Currently the house is covered with white vinyl siding with bluegrey trim. We will eventually remove that because we suspect there’s some cool details underneath. There are 4 stained glass windows, including a large red and white focal window on the third floor, surrounded by elaborate semi-circular shingle details. Those are not covered in vinyl and are currently very chipped and faded paint that looks to be blue and red. There is also a 3/4 wrap around porch that is in need of paint and is currently white with a blue grey floor. With all the other renovations needed, it will be many years before we redo the exterior so for now it’s been power washed and we will paint the porch and the focal work to freshen things up.
We are still trying to decide a good color scheme to paint the shingle details surrounding the stained glass. I do not want red, white, and blue.
A fixer-upper Victorian is my DREAM, Emily! Congrats on the purchase! Sounds like you’ve got some great plans.
Yes, though please to god no wall mounted telly 😉
We just chose the color for our house Jasper Stone by sherwin williams. It’s a mid tone bluegreengrey in a similar color as blue hostas. We drove all over our town and looked at every house we could and nearly no one has this color. However, we have blue across the street, tan, white, green, grey on the houses around us. We wanted our house to be different from everyone else but not garish or weird. We painted our detached garage first so we could live with it and still change it if we hated it. So far we are in LOVE. 9 months of snow means we didn’t want white. House is scheduled for paint soon so I’m holding my breath that I still like it when it’s done.
Hi Susan! We recently purchased an old farmhouse that is painted a dusty olive colour with cream gingerbread trim. It looks terrible in the snow — so dirty! — and the green of our gardens really emphasize the yellow-ness in the colours (in a bad way). We’re back and forth about whether we want to keep the green, but if we do, looking good in the snow and with the gardens is our key priority. If you don’t mind, I would love to hear how Jasper Stone on the garage looks with your gardens, and also what trim colour you are using. Thanks so much! And hope the house turns out amazing for you!
I have a stucco Craftsman style house that I had to do remediation on. We put James Hardie siding on two elevations, and the rest we left stucco. Originally, we were going to paint the stucco the same color as the siding, but when we considered the different texture (stucco is comparatively smooth and flat despite having a rough texture), the color did not translate at ALL. It’s much easier to achieve the desired color and have it look true to sample when dealing with siding, clapboard, shingles, etc. We ended up doing a darker paint color on the stucco that works with the siding color. The funny thing is, I really wanted to choose a blue James Hardie siding, but knowing we needed to paint the stucco prevented me from going with that. Blue stucco would have been hideous!
We just painted our house, and I got dizzy trying to pick the colors. Sherwin Williams has free zoom meetings with color consultants–as many as you need to whittle down the options. I found that helpful in choosing the right combo, shade of white trim, etc.
We just did our PNW split level in SW Deep Sea Dive with white trim. It is bolder than the surrounding houses but makes me so happy!
We recently purchased and renovated a home built in 1888. The previous owner had it painted to match a home owned by the Historical Society down the street, but it didn’t feel “right” to me. We painted it two shades of blue which feel much more cheerful for the old summer resort vibe in our town in MN. Attached is a before/after shot (ignore the sad landscaping and wood on the porch floor which is now red to match the door).
What a cute house, Amy!
I love this! I’m so glad you went colorful with the blue (vs replacing the colorful purple with a grey or something) and I love the different shades of blue and the red door. Kudos!
That looks so pretty! You picked great colors!
Yes! I’ve painted four houses and debating our current lake house in the woods.
House one: Ttraditional colonial style, went from faded beige to Mark Twain House Ombra Gray which is such a good greige
House two: Brick bungalow with a few white paneled accents that I painted Shoji White so a bit warmer
House three: Brick ranch with a paneled sunroom addition, went from brick red to Jasper (dark green black and AMAZING)
House four: Double porch house in the city, went from tan with green accents to a medium blue with white accents; we were prepping it for resale and I wasn’t big on the color because I’m just not a blue person but it looked nice and sold quickly
House five: Huge cedar-sided MCM-esque house in the woods on a lake; currently a brownish-gray but thinking about a deep green or warm black, or white
we painted our 120 year old victorian BM wrought iron with Onyx trim. Then there seemed to be an influx of black painted houses in our same neighborhood. I just loved the way green/florals pop off the black backdrop and wanted the garden to stand out. It also coincided with a relatively modern renovation and addition we did.
I LOVE a “weird” exterior. Give me a garden gnome collection!!! A million tiny windmills!! A DIY garage mural!! A purple house!! Stained glass doors!! Your kid’s front-yard playhouse with Christmas lights on it year-round!! A life-sized dinosaur made of scrap metal!! A fence with each board planted a different color!! I think exteriors are so often lifeless—I like when people let their weird show to the neighborhood? (Can you tell I hate HOAs? lol)
One of our neighbors has a giant praying mantis statue in their front yard (I mean GIANT, over 6 ft tall) and it cracks me up. I love how weird it is.
Yes! This is perfect.
I know painting a house exterior in a dark color is trendy right now but I have heard that the color fades quickly in the sun and ends up being a maintenance hassle to keep it looking good. Would like to hear from anyone who has had a dark painted house that gets strong sun, and how the paint has held up for you. On a side note, there is a house in our small town, right on Main St, that has alot of ornate trim but they painted it in bright primary colors and it looks like a circus tent to me. Bright yellow, red and blue. Not a good look in my opinion. Similarly, on the street where we used to have a vacation place by the beach, our neighbors 2 doors down painted their house cantaloupe orange with white trim but they never painted the shutters, which were brown. So, that was super bright but the shutters looked bad.
it’s me!! I totally regret painting our house dark. I am not sure of the exact paint color, but it’s an almost-black / almost-navy blue. It is a beautiful color. It is a plantation style cottage in Honolulu with siding and big louvre windows. We did white trim. It looked so beautiful upon installation (it was previously a sad dusty lilac – gray), but it immediately made the house hotter, and now, it gets SO HOT on one side that some of the black siding parts have actually warped!! it is the worst. If i could do it again I would switch it, and do white with black trim around the windows – still that same sort of effect but more livable. Or – and this is boring – a paler neutral like Emily offers. I guess dusty lilac was chosen for a reason.
In the country I reside in (NZ) we can purchase paint formulated to reflect heat so you can paint your exterior a dark shade without it retaining heat. Do you have a similar range in the States? I painted our roughcast home in a ‘Cool colour’ shade of aubergine and six years on it is holding up really well. The black pigment in the paint is replaced by a heat deflecting pigment of some description.
So, not a house, but our church is painted all black. It’s only been about seven years and it’s SO faded, it looks terrible. It needs to be re-painted. Not sure if the wrong paint type was used? It doesn’t get a ton of direct sun; it’s under a bunch of mature trees across the street from a park. It looked so good fresh, but with the way it’s aged? I’d never paint a house that dark…i wouldn’t want to deal with the maintenance.
We did this…we live in Colorado and painted our 2000 era house mid/dark brown with super dark brown trim. It was beautiful initially but has faded soooooooooo much. Especially the west side – like, 5 shades lighter (and we painted 8 years ago now). Maybe 8 years is as much as you can reasonably expect with house paint, but I am so not excited to pay for repainting, especially after having to replace our water heater, deck railings, and entire HVAC system this year 😫.
Painted our house a very dark green 5 years ago and used a BM paint that was rated for exterior use. The painter said using exterior paint should slow fading and he was right, if there is fading it is negligible to unnoticeable.
Love this topic! And I could really use help from all you design-minded folks! We have a very YELLOW house in Asheville, NC — it is about 100 years old with three giant oak trees in the front yard and a white picket fence. The yellow (with red roof!) does not jive with the vibe of our inside of our home at all (moved here from LA, so still have lots of pacific/natural colors, terracotta tones, browns, etc. in our decor). I dream of a nice clean white house, but our neighbors on both sides (and more past them) have white homes. They all have different architecture, but I worry I’ll be doing the block a disserve by painting the cheerful yellow house white. Should I follow my heart anyway? Find a compromise classic blue or similar less-shouty color? Other ideas?? Help!
Ok I think the yellow is super cheerful and fun but it’s not my house. What about a nice, muted/dusty greenybluey color that would be opposite the color wheel of the red roof? Then it could mesh a little better with your “pacific” stuff and not be as boring as just a white house? Just a thought!
Have you done image searches for houses with red roofs? You might see if there is anything besides white that you like! Your roof is very bossy so unless you’re planning to change it soon, you’ll need to have a paint color that’s friends with it 🙂 I agree the ketchup and mustard combo is not my preference either. I painted my last home Revere Pewter with a red door (and charcoal roof, white trim) and it was great. In outdoor light that paint color looks like a nice pale oatmeal color. Not white, but giving a light enough feel to satisfy me!
I wonder if researching craftsman color palettes might turn something up? I know they have that rust color woven in, sometimes with muted greens and taupes.
So cute!! My neighbors have a very similarly-styled house with a red roof. They went with white and beige for the exterior, with the body being white. The red roof struck me as an interesting choice, especially since they re-roofed and could have chosen any color. I think white would look classic, and who cares if the other neighbors also have white houses! That means your house will fit in with the character of the area. Something in the beige/taupe family could also work if you really don’t want white. I know it sounds boring, but your house has lovely architecture, so I would allow that to speak for itself and have the color be something neutral.
aw i appreciate the yellow cheer too. is the roof due for an update. change the roof color perhaps?
Don’t forget to consider the exisiting roof color. There are so many houses in my neighborhood where the house color clashes with the roof color. On one house the roof looked pink (it was really a warm gray) when the house was painted blue.
Oh, the timing of this post. I am literally sitting in my home office, listening to the sounds of my house finally being painted. It’s a small LA ranch style home that had a sad, faded light blue and a dingy white trim…it needed a lot of love. I chose a medium warm gray for the house, white trim and (my favorite) navy blue shutters. I cannot WAIT until it’s done on Friday.
I really loved reading this post because I struggled to find the exact colors I imagined to be the best fit, and it’s so nice to hear I’m not alone in this. Emily – I truly love all the choices you have made with the paint colors for each of your homes and hope I feel that same joy after everything is done!
Love this post! Could you follow up with a post regarding painting shutters?
I recommend painting a large sample of the colore (s) you are considering on the sunny side of the house and on the SHADY side. Don’t have the samples too close to each other.
I think you are right that the larger the home, the safer to play it. I’m in a large, much added on to, mongrel style home that is clad in old cedar shingles that are unfortunately at the end of their lifespan. As we consider materials and colors for a future exterior renovation, I think I’m sticking with something similar in gray-brown color to the weathered wood. The house is kind of hulking and awkward on the outside, so anything that can help it graceful feel at home in the landscape and not draw much attention is good.
Landscaping is a huge part of making a boring color look good – paint can’t do all the heavy lifting!
Victorian in the northeast – we painted the main body of the house a tomato red, with taupe and dark cream trim and white windows. It may not sound good written down, but I love it and 15 years on it’s time to repaint and I will keep it all the same!
50 shades of brown here in Arizona. That’s pretty much all we have. So sad and uninspiring! I miss the colorful homes I grew up with in the Midwest.
I live in a large city in the NE and my block is ca, 1910 twins, and I love when twins flip color schemes for the paintable elements on our brick houses. My party wall neighbor was able to repaint before I could, in a palette of green, blue, and yellow for the various ca. 1910 ornamentation on our houses. When I was able to repaint, I took her color scheme and reversed most of the elements, so when you look at our twin you see the same colors but rearranged between the two houses in a complemtary way. A number of other houses in our neighborhood use the same device.
We bought an 1848 farmhouse in NE Ohio last year, it’s white. I never thought I’d want to paint it a different color until we got moved in and started to notice that 8/10 houses in our area are white. So, now we are considering painting it an ochre-y yellow. I’m hoping it would be different enough to stand out (in a good way) but still feel appropriate to the period and the property. It’s almost 5,000sqft, so I am definitely losing some sleep over it.
That color is a classic choice in New England. Lots of yellow colonials there. I think it will make your house look amazing!
Oh my goodness, you are good at this!
we bought a folk victorian (1913) in 2020. In 2019, the previous owners replaced the storms with red vinyl. The house right now is a VERY bright blue with red trim everywhere else and i low key hate it. I don’t hate blue, but woof, the shade of blue is not it. add it it, red trims are We have to get the house painted in the next year or two and I am struggling with what color to paint. I’ve leaned towards thermal by behr for the body and white trim (we had that on a craftsman house previously and loved). i’ve also seen houses with like a grey/blue/green with beigy/brown trim that i think could be exciting. It’s hard when you have an older home and knowing that you can and should go with a bold color but knowing that it can get tricky with picking the RIGHT color.
My husband and I are in the middle of prepping our house to paint right now. (Side note: if you can afford to pay someone to paint your house, DO IT. It’s so much work just to prep, and I wish we could afford to pay someone.) We settled on blue pretty early on in the process – part of that was reactionary to all the houses in our neighborhood that are white, beige, and gray, and part of it is because we have one exterior wall that we can see from our living room, so we needed to pick a color that looked good with our inside decor. Since we have a lot of green decor inside, we thought blue would go well, while also providing a nice backdrop to all our plants outside. But picking the actual shade of blue? Whew, what a process! I think we tried 18 different samples ranging from light to dark. We painted all these over the existing color. We thought we’d finally narrowed it down to 2 choices (SW Loyal Blue and SW Moscow Midnight), so we painted primer first and then put larger swatches of those colors on top, and woooowwwww… Read more »
Emily, your insights on choosing exterior paint colors are so relatable! I love the idea of considering the surrounding environment and the house’s architectural style. Your tips on testing colors in different lighting conditions and getting samples are super practical. Thanks for making a daunting task feel manageable and even exciting!
I’m big stickler for sticking with history. I even was shocked and sad to see the classic old hollywood type Tudor without the brown trim. The change is really is pretty but it feels like a slow motion Noooooooooooooooo for me. It’s just such a classic home! How could you not keep brown trim!!? But then it really is what brings people joy which seems like the best goal. I also think the super dark house is like a trying to be modern and cool and doesn’t fit the locale a lot of the time. It when people try to make their classic homes modern and cool and paint white with black trim. It’s so sad and trendy and not Cuute. Stick with the classicssss. With that said, I love the periwinkle single story home on my childhood street and I love that my mom chose a burgandy almost cherry trim for our traditional home. I think it’s just putting your stamp on it or sticking with classics. Just please no, don’t go with a trend. Instantly dated.
we ended up purchasing our dream house in 2015 and the interior needed a total renovation while the exterior had excellent steel siding in my least favorite color……………. bright red. But, like, I always think I didn’t have to pay for it and it’s good quality and really mixes well with the neighborhood we are in. We “got to” replace the shingles and went with charcoal to make it “pop”. Plus my nieces call it the “red house” so it is kind of endearing now.
We painted our super long mid century ranch, white with a pink front door. Had to replace the roof a year later and went with a dark charcoal color. Trim and windows white, too. Absolutely loved it at the time. (Even tho I customarily choose 3 colors for exterior/trim/accents) Now that so many in the neighborhood have painted theirs white, I’m feeling like mine is now trendy and too much of the same. I know white is classic, but too many others have done the same and now mine feels less special and more like an easy “flip choice”.